Unbreakable Chains
by grum
Summary: Sequel to To Break Her Chains. Undergoing rewrite in parallel with book1. This is pre-rewrite version.
1. An Influential Encounter

An Influential Encounter  
  
Ukyou looked up at the sign over her new school. Her new, all-boys  
school. At ten, she was still young enough not to need breast bindings  
to appear male. Dressing in masculine fashion was sufficient. The other  
boy's voices had not yet dropped, so she didn't even really need to  
conceal her higher tones. The difference was too slight to be  
noticeable.  
  
Indeed, after five years of living as a boy, she no longer really needed  
to think about it to mimic the boys' behavior, and fit in easily.  
Nonetheless, she stood and looked for a long moment at the sign. Five  
years she had lived each day as a boy... but this would be her first day  
at an all-boys school.  
  
Most of her classes that day seemed normal. The boys, in fact, seemed  
quieter during class than they had at her old school. Maybe that was  
because there were no girls there to impress. But between classes they  
were quite rowdy. She was prepared for that, but not for the scene that  
day at lunch. The swarm of boys was rushing, pushing, and shoving to get  
to the front and get a piece of the bread of the day before it was all  
gone. A call rang out, loud above the voices of the boys, "Last curry  
bread of the day!"   
  
Ukyou saw a bread go sailing up over the heads of the boys. Joining in,  
she vaulted over the boys, just as one boy leapt up, shouting, "Its  
mine!" She landed on his head, and leapt upward, catching the curry  
bread. She bit a chunk out of it on the way down. Quite good, really.  
Not as good as her okynomiyaki, but still good.   
  
Ukyou was shocked to see tears of bitterness in the boy's eyes as he  
glared at her. She wondered at first why he was so angry. He shouted  
something at her, but she lost it in the general din. Moving closer, she  
could see that his clothes were several days worn, and guessed that he  
hadn't been home.   
  
She knew what a hard home life could be like, and started working her  
way through the crowd to him. He had turned away by that point, to leave  
the cafeteria, and she realized that unlike her and the other boys, he  
did not have a lunch with him. She realized with a shock that the bread  
would have been his only lunch. She pushed the crowd, eliciting startled  
yells, and reached his side, just as he exited the lunchroom.  
  
He looked at her when she pulled on his sleeve, and recognized her with  
a look of rage on his face. She ignored it. "C'mon, man, let's go  
outside. I'll make you an okynomiyaki." The look on his face at that was  
stunned amazement, but she ignored it, and grabbed his sleeve, forcing  
him to keep up with her.   
  
They exited the front doors of the school, and she headed for a tree.  
She sat beneath it, and pulled out her portable griddle, and her batter  
and ingredients. She poured batter on the smooth surface. "Beef or  
Pork?" she asked the boy.  
  
"Huh?"   
  
"Beef then," she responded. She flipped the okynomiyaki, and prepped the  
ingredients. Then she flipped it again, peppering it with the beef and  
other toppings as it spun in the air. She caught it easily, and handed  
it to the boy.  
  
He looked at it wide-eyed for a moment, then said, "Thanks!" with a wide  
grin, and took it from her. It was half way in his mouth the next  
moment, and in another, it was gone.   
  
"Wow. You sure eat fast," she commented. Good thing she had extra  
batter. She slapped two more on the griddle. "I'm sorry about the bread.  
It's my first day here, and I just kinda reacted." She flipped them  
both. She wanted to ask him why he didn't have a lunch... but she  
figured he'd probably be embarrassed about it. But she needed a friend  
here, and he looked like a good kid. Funny looking teeth though, she  
commented to herself, noting his long canines. But a hungry kid is a  
good friend for a chef. She flipped both, peppering them with toppings,  
and handed him one as she bit into the other. "How 'bout I catch you  
after school, and I'll treat you dinner to make up for it? My dad makes  
the best okynomiyaki ever!"  
  
"Uhmm... yeah, sure." Just then the lunch bell rang, and Ukyou had to  
hurry to cool down her griddle enough to stow it and get to her next  
class. To her surprise, the guy from lunch was in her last class. She  
motioned to him when he came in, and he took the seat beside hers. It  
was math, which she was pretty good at. Her dad had drilled her in it as  
a kid. You had to be reasonably good at basic math to run a restaurant.  
  
She caught up to him as he left the room after class. "Hey, man. I never  
got your name. I'm Kuonji Ukyou."  
  
"Oh, uhm. Hi. Hibiki Ryouga. Nice ta meetcha."  
  
"Well, come on, then. Dad'll be annoyed if we're late for dinner."  
  
Ryouga allowed himself to be pulled out of the school, and along the  
street. He was busily wondering where he was lying asleep, and when he  
would wake up. Things like this just didn't happen to him.  
  
His friends at school called him 'Lost Boy,' and they meant it. He had  
the world's worst sense of direction. He only found his way home about  
once a week, and so he spent a lot of the time going hungry. He didn't  
have all that many friends... it wasn't easy to make or keep them when  
you were wearing three or four day old clothing half the time, and  
always looked hungry. It didn't help that he had sharp teeth, just like  
the vampires in the movies, so a hungry look from him made most people  
want to turn and run.  
  
Then today at lunch, yet again, some new kid had come along, and taken  
his bread, that would have been his only lunch for the day. He had  
shouted out his usual challenge, then marched out of the lunch hall,  
knowing that he'd find the kid sometime after school, and teach him not  
to steal his bread again. Or he wouldn't have to, cause his friends  
would get to the kid first, and point out how mean it was to take  
something from somebody who had nothing.   
  
But he didn't get to, cause the kid showed up right beside him, hauled  
him outside, and cooked him several delicious okynomiyaki. He had hardly  
believed the kid when he invited him to come over and eat with his  
family, and had responded half-heartedly, but not really expected to see  
the kid again. Yet here he was, being dragged off to Ukyou's house to  
eat his father's okynomiyaki.  
  
He pinched himself. Ouch. Nope, not awake yet.  
  
---   
  
Ukyou stood on the steps of her father's home watching Ryouga. He was  
standing at the edge of the street, looking back and forth. He clearly  
didn't know which way to go. She sighed, and walked down to stand beside  
him. "Don't know how to get home from here, huh? It's ok, I'll walk you  
back to the school. You can get home from there, right?"  
  
"Uhm...," Ryouga looked down, and scuffed his foot against the ground.  
Oh dear, Ukyou thought, he can't have that bad a sense of direction can  
he?   
  
"You can't? Hmmm. Alright, how about this. I'll ask my father if you can  
stay the night. I think we've got an extra futon somewhere. You can  
crash in the living room. After school tomorrow, we'll go by the office.  
They're sure to have your address on file. I should be able to find your  
house then, ok?"  
  
Ryouga looked at Ukyou with startled eyes. "You'd... really? You think  
you're dad would let me stay?"  
  
"Yeah, sure, why not?" Its not like I'm a girl or something, she though  
ironically to herself. That was why she had suggested the living room.  
She didn't think her dad would take being a guy so far as to let another  
guy crash in her bedroom.  
  
---  
  
At lunch the next day, Ukyou again cooked Ryouga several okynomiyaki,  
and Ryouga finally began to get used to the idea that he wasn't  
dreaming, and that somehow he had managed to gain a friend who didn't  
just want protection from bullies or someone to tease. On the way over,  
Ukyou had seen Ryouga's terrible sense of direction first hand, but said  
nothing, simply grabbing Ryouga's sleeve, and pulling him after her.  
Ryouga had nevertheless been startled when Ukyou had caught up to him as  
he was racing for the lunchroom, and pulled him from the crush of  
students. He was about to erupt in anger, when he saw who it was,  
and his stomach rumbled in memory of the delicious okynomiyaki Ukyou had  
cooked the day before.  
  
After school, when Ukyou again caught him, and hauled him down to the  
office, and dealt with the curiousity of the clerks, getting the  
information without mentioning Ryouga's difficulty, Ryouga was becoming  
seriously confused. He had never had a friend who didn't want something  
before, and he was started to get worried... whatever Ukyou wanted, it  
was bound to be big.  
  
When Ukyou actually found his house, though, and his mother turned out  
to be home, he was so excited that it simply slipped his mind that he  
had meant to ask Ukyou what he really wanted. He just introduced Ukyou  
to his mother, and badgered him into staying for dinner. Ukyou obviously  
appreciated the meal, commenting on the different flavours. He ended up  
making them okynomiyaki for dessert, after Ryouga's mother asked him  
about his interest in food, and he told them about his father's  
restaurant.   
  
The next morning, as Ryouga was leaving his house, greatly relieved to  
be wearing fresh new clothes, and to have had time to soak in a real  
bath last night, he was startled to find Ukyou balanced on the front  
fence, waiting for him. Ukyou didn't say anything, just grabbed Ryouga,  
pulling him up onto the fence, and running ahead, hauling Ryouga along  
behind. Halfway there, he glanced back, and laughing, shouted, "I knew  
you could do it, Ryouga. You run fences before?" Ryouga just shook his  
head. He was trying to avoid thinking about it too much. He was a  
martial artist, and he had good balance, but damn it was gonna hurt if  
his feet slipped. He grimaced just thinking about it.  
  
---  
  
That Saturday, Ukyou again showed up outside Ryouga's house. Ukyou  
hollered up at Ryouga's window, tossing a rock up to rap against  
it, "Hey, Ryouga. One of your friends told me you were a martial artist.  
What say we go down to the park, and spar?"  
  
Ryouga poked his head out the window, nodded happily, and jumped out,  
landing lightly on the lawn. "Sure... say, what's that?" he asked,  
noticing the bandolier of... spatulas? Not to mention that massive  
spatula on Ukyou's back...  
  
"I do Martial Arts Okynomiyaki," Ukyou said, grabbing his sleeve.  
"C'mon, let's go." Ukyou again leapt onto their fence, pulling Ryouga up  
behind him.   
  
Ryouga leaned up against a tree, after they had tired of sparring,  
looking out over the pond. "That was fun. You're really good, Ukyou. Did  
your dad teach you?"  
  
"Yeah...," Ukyou's voice had suddenly grown dark and angry, and Ryouga  
looked over at him in surprise. "I gotta be good enough to get my  
revenge." Ryouga didn't comment. He knew how that was. He had had many  
fights for revenge.  
  
---  
  
It was three years later, shortly before the end of a school year, when  
they were both thirteen, that Ryouga got lost one night. Early the next  
morning, cold and wet, in driving rain, he found himself outside Ukyou's  
house, and decided to wait. He would go to school with Ukyou, and Ukyou  
would bring him home.   
  
Ryouga leapt lightly to land on Ukyou's windowsill, and was about to  
rap on the window pane, when he realized what he was seeing. Ukyou, not  
looking at him, but at a mirror, was wincing as... as _she_ carefully  
bound her... her... Ryouga's nose dripped blood, and he lost his hold on  
the window, and fell with a wet thud to the ground below, not noticing  
the rain spattering down at him.  
  
He got up suddenly, afraid she would look out and see him, and in a  
flash he was over the fence and gone. It was some time before he looked  
up, and he had no idea where he was. He sat, huddled and miserable,  
under a bridge, as the rain poured down around him.   
  
His thoughts were in a turmoil. His best friend was a... a... a girl? It  
didn't even occur to him to think that she had lied to him. She had  
never told him she was a guy... , he said to  
himself. He  
answered himself almost immediately.   
  
He... he was no better than they had been, peeping on her like that.  
Even if he hadn't known, he had seen her... her... He pinched his nose.  
  
  
That's when he decided. He owed her. For everything she had done for  
him, for being his friend, even when he was just a dirty, smelly guy who  
couldn't find his way out of a wet paper bag, she had been his friend.  
He'd have to forget what he'd seen, just forget it, until she was ready  
to tell him... or ready to leave. He would have to go with her, then.  
Whoever had done this to her, whatever evil thing he had done to make  
her live like this, he had to pay.   
  
---  
  
It was nearly a year later that they were sitting in a park, having just  
finished a vigorous sparring session. It had taken everything Ryouga  
had, the year before, to think of her as a guy again, and to spar as if  
nothing had changed. But he had... and now he got the feeling something  
was about to change. Would she tell him, he wondered?   
  
He had watched her, occasionally, when she went alone to the park. The  
look of utter hatred and fury she wore when she attacked the trees had  
pained him. He knew now who had hurt her so badly. She had chanted his  
name, as she attacked the tree. Ranma... and then afterwards, she had  
sat, slumped against it, crying, and sobbing about 'Ranchan.' Ryouga  
wondered if it was the same person.  
  
He looked at her now, and she had a look of pain and determination on  
her face.  
  
"Ryouga," she said, then faltered.  
  
"I'm coming with you, Ukyou," he stated.  
  
She stared at him in stunned surprise. "What? But, but, how?"  
  
"I don't know what this Ranma character did to you," he said vehemently,  
"But you didn't deserve it. Whatever it was, you didn't deserve it. If  
you leave without me, Ukyou, I'm just gonna be the Lost Boy again,  
wandering, never knowing where I am. There's only one thing I can do  
with my life that's worth doing... and that's go with my best friend,  
and help her do what she's gotta do." He had practiced this speech in  
his head for nearly a year.  
  
Ukyou's eyes grew wide... "How... how long?" How did he find out, she  
thought, how?  
  
"About a year, Ukyou. Please let me come with you. I meant what I said.  
If you don't let me come, I'm just gonna end up wandering, never  
accomplishing anything. I won't interfere in your revenge. I understand  
that kinda stuff. But I can help you keep your edge, while you hunt for  
him, can't I?" His eyes pleaded with hers. He needed this, his honor  
needed this. She had given him his life back. For four years, he had had  
a normal life, like a normal boy. She had given him something she had  
never had. She hadn't had a normal life. She had been forced to live  
like a guy, and now it was his turn to help her.  
  
"I... you're sure? You really want to come and help me? I don't know how  
long it will be. I could be searching a very long time."  
  
"Come on, Ukyou. What else am I gonna do?" He grinned up at her, willing  
her to see the humour. She laughed, and his smile widened, showing his  
sharp canines.  
  
"Alright, Ryouga. Come with me then." Then she sat, and she told him the  
story.  
  
She told him how she had met Ranchan, when his father had distracted  
them so he could snatch an okynomiyaki from the cart, and she had  
attacked him to get it back. He had defeated her, and eaten it.  
  
They had fought every morning thereafter, and played together for hours.  
Then finally, she had gone to her daddy, and asked him to engage her to  
Ranma. She hadn't really understood what it meant to be married, only  
that it meant being together forever, and she wanted to keep her best  
friend forever.  
  
His father had agreed... and then the next morning, Genma-san had taken  
the yatai, her dowry, and run away. She had chased after them crying in,  
and watched hopelessly as the yatai had dwindled in the distance, Ranma  
sitting on it, waving at her.  
  
When she came back to herself, she found that Ryouga was holding her,  
comforting her, and she was sobbing into his shoulder. It hurt everytime  
she thought about it, but it was worse when she had to talk about it, to  
acknowledge that Ranchan had left her.  
  
Ryouga didn't say anything. He couldn't. It was all he could do to  
just maintain the pretense that he was comforting his best friend, a  
guy, not holding a girl. He just held her. 


	2. Pools of Sorrow

Pools of Sorrow  
  
  
The Jusenkyo guide looked up in surprise at the brilliant flash of white  
light outside his hut. A young man stood there, clothed in a tight  
fitting black shirt that highlighted his strong musculature, and loose  
pants. He was tall, six foot at least. His hair was black, and his  
eyes a deep blue. He was staring at the pools. "Honored Customer  
understands Mandarin, yes?" asked the guide.   
  
The young man turned to him, "Very well, thank you, Honored Guide. Tell  
me please, which pool is the Nyannichuan?" The guide turned almost  
purple. Customers NEVER listened to him, never heard him until AFTER  
they had fallen in.   
  
"No, no, Honored Customer, you must not go to that pool. Is very tragic  
story," he said quickly.   
  
Ranma interjected, "Yes, yes, I know. Very tragic story. Now which one  
is it?"  
  
The Guide sighed. Even when they listened, it did no good. He said,  
"Very well, Honored Customer, I see you will not listen, like all the  
others. Nyannichuan is this way." He led the boy on a careful path   
through the pools, before finally pointing to one.   
  
He sighed, and watched, as the young man set down his pack, then waded  
in and dunked his head. She broke the surface, brilliant red hair  
glistening in the sun. The Guide gulped, and quickly turned away, as she  
rose. The shirt that had been tight on the young man was looser on her  
waist, but threatening to burst under the pressure from her chest. She  
looked down. "Wow," she said, then quickly stripped off the shirt. The  
Guide fainted. She climbed out of the pool. She rummaged in her pack for  
a minute or two, then found a looser shirt, and put it on. Looking over  
at the Guide, laying in a pool of blood that seemed to have leaked from  
his nose, she lifted him easily to her shoulders, then tromped back the  
way she had come, focusing the Juushin Jisei ito keep from accidentally  
falling into any of the other pools.  
  
When the Guide came to, he was lying in his own bed, a cool cloth on his  
forehead, being watched by the beautiful redhead. She was nearly a foot  
shorter than her male side, built smaller, but still well muscled.  
"Sorry to put you through that," she said, her voice softer and  
richer than it had been as a man. He gulped again in surprise. A  
customer apologizing to him? That had never happened before. They were  
always furious with him, even though he tried as hard as he could to  
stop them.   
  
"You... you knew what would happen?" he asked, his fear clear in his  
voice.  
  
She laughed, a delightful sound. "Yes, I knew. Now, you just lie here.  
I've got to do something. Don't interfere, please. It would be very  
bad, if you did." She stood up, and he noticed that she had drawn on the  
wood floor of his hut a circle in chalk, with strange symbols around it,  
and was standing in it. She reached behind her, and pulled off the  
small band that held her pigtail, and shook her head, freeing her  
glorious fiery hair, which fell in soft curves over her shoulders,  
spilling down her strong back.   
  
She started chanting something, in a strange language, and he realized  
she had produced a scroll from somewhere and was reading it. How strange  
today was. First that crying man had come and turned into a panda, now  
this young man comes and turns himself into a girl and starts chanting  
strange things in his hut.   
  
She seemed to suddenly have come to the conclusion of her chant. She  
slumped bonelessly to the ground. He got quickly out of his bed, and  
felt her neck. Her pulse was steady and strong. He lifted her, and  
placed her on his bed, watching worriedly. How strange this was.  
  
After several hours, he heard movement outside. Leaving her, he found  
that the crying man had returned. He was jabbering excitedly about  
having finally 'felt his ki again!' and asking about a man named Ranma.  
When the Guide finally understood that the man was asking whether a  
young man had been by, he became nervous. This man was a martial artist,  
and the young man was now an unconscious young woman. If this crying man  
decided to kill or take advantage of the young lady, there would be  
little the Guide could do to help. He too was a martial artist, but he  
did not feel he was in this crying man's league.   
  
He tried to draw the man out, slowly. He got enough of a physical  
description to think that this might indeed be the young man the crying  
man wanted... hair color and eye color were right, and he did indeed  
look Japanese, like the crying man. What finally convinced him was when  
the crying man explained that he was looking for his son, that he had  
been looking for him for eight years, and that he had just felt the  
touch of his son's ki.   
  
He led the man into the hut, and pointed to the young girl. In broken  
Japanese, he said, "Young man come, ask for Nyannichuan. I try to warn,  
but very insistent. Finally show him, he go in, she come out."  
  
The crying man broke down, wailing his anguish. The promise was broken,  
he would have to commit seppeku. The Guide had considerable difficulty  
understanding him, as he was wailing in Japanese, and too fast, and so  
assumed that the man's anguish was a natural thing for a father to feel  
about a son who had just been cursed. He did have to convince the man  
not to throw the boiling water for tea onto the young woman. "Much  
better when awake, you see, you see."  
  
---  
  
Ranma found himself sitting on a hill, looking over a valley. A stream  
ran down the hill from somewhere behind him, and babbled happily as it  
gurgled across the stony bed, before falling in a spray of color down  
the hill. All about, the land was green and bright. He noticed that he  
was male again, and wearing his tight black shirt. From behind him, he  
heard a tentative voice say, "Ranma?"  
  
He spun around, coming immediately to a defensive posture, before  
relaxing. She was standing there, looking demure and frightened, yet  
truly beautiful, hair like a glorious nimbus of fire around her exotic  
face, with delicate features and wide slightly upturned almond shaped  
eyes, that sparkled a brilliant blue. She had a marvelous figure, and  
she was wearing a short yellow sundress.  
  
She took a hesitant step toward him, and asked again, "Ranma, is that  
really you?" When he nodded, her face lit up in joy, and he felt his  
heart hammering in his chest. She leapt forward, wrapping her arms  
around him. He responded slowly, then hugged her tightly as he felt her  
sob into his chest. "Oh, Ranma, I've been so lonely waiting for you."  
  
"What do you mean?" he asked. "You weren't supposed to have awakened  
until just now."  
  
"No, no," she said, "I've been awake ever since that terrible pit with  
the cats. After... after you became the cat... the first time you woke  
up, the cat came here, and woke me up."  
  
"Neko-Ranma is in here?" he asked, incredulous.   
  
"Yes, he's ever so much fun."   
  
"I... I... I'm sorry. I wish I had known. I've kept you caged in here  
for so long. I wish I could make it up to you."  
  
"Don't feel bad, Ranma. You couldn't have known. Come with me, I want to  
show you my house."  
  
He followed her down the slope of the hill, and saw a beautiful one   
story house of stone thatched with straw.   
  
"Wow. You made this?"  
  
"Oh yes. Neko! Neko, come here." She called out to the house, and the  
front door swung wide, and Neko-Ranma came running out, on all fours,  
and loped up to them, then sat and looked at them inscrutably for a  
moment, before starting to wind himself between their legs, rubbing up  
against them both, and purring.   
  
"So that's how you recognized me. He looks just like me."  
  
"He is you, Ranma. So am I. Come inside, please." She led him  
inside, and sat him down on a couch. Neko-Ranma jumped up and curled up  
on Ranma's lap, purring softly. Ranma petted his hair, and scratched  
behind his ears. She sat down beside him, and scratched Neko-Ranma's  
back lightly. "I've been wanting to meet you for a long time. I know  
what Alana told you."  
  
"You know about Alana?," he asked in surprise.   
  
"Yes, Ranma. I know that when Neko gets out, you don't remember. But I  
can see what you see, and I see what he sees. I watched him kill that  
man," and she saw the color drain from his face. "Ranma," she said  
sharply, "It wasn't his fault. That man tried to force him to kill  
someone else. He deserved it. Alana was right. And before you ask, no  
she didn't know I was awake either." Ranma sighed, and went back to  
petting Neko-Ranma's soft hair. Ranko considered for a moment whether to  
tell him that the Lady Sylia had known, but decided that he would feel  
less guilty if he didn't know.  
  
"Maybe now, when you let Neko or me out, you can come here, and watch  
us, if you want to."  
  
"What do you mean, let Neko out? He only comes out when I've been driven  
mad by cats. And that won't happen anymore. I've gotten over the fear."  
  
"I know you have Ranma. But he's still a part of you, or he wouldn't be  
here. Surely you don't intend to keep him locked up in here forever, do  
you?" She looked at him with pleading eyes, big and blue, and glistening  
with tears, and he felt himself melt inside.   
  
"No, I can't do that, can I. But I've got to be able to keep him from  
killing."   
  
"But Ranma, if you let him out, then you aren't hiding... so you can be  
here watching, and take over if he goes too far."  
  
"Hey, you're right! That's wonderful! And.. and that must mean that you  
know what I've just done," and his voice was suddenly small and scared.  
Here, inside his mind, he couldn't hide behind his barriers of ice, and  
his emotions were constantly visible on his face.  
  
"Yes, Ranma, I know." She threw her arms about him, and hugged him  
fiercely. Neko-Ranma meowed piteously, trapped between them, and leapt  
to escape. "And I love you for it. Its more than I ever dared hope for.  
More than I deserve."  
  
"No," he said sharply, "It isn't more than you deserve. You deserve so  
much more,... Oh dear. I just realized I don't know what to call you,  
Red."   
  
"Red will do nicely, Ranma. But maybe, outside, I can be Ranko?" and she  
looked up at him with those glorious deep blue eyes, light glinting off  
a hint of moisture, and he lost himself in their swirling depths.   
  
"Of course you can," he replied then he realized something was missing.  
"Where'd Neko-Ranma disappear to?"   
  
"He went out," she said, quietly, silently pleading for him to not be   
angry, "do you want to go watch him?"   
  
"Yes, please," he replied, trying to hold on to his sudden fear. That  
poor Guide, surely Neko wouldn't hurt him.  
  
Red held him, and the scene changed around them, and they were sitting  
on a large rock, and before them was a pool, still and crystal clear,  
and as he looked at the pool, it suddenly clouded, and then he saw what  
Neko-Ranma was seeing... a panda, running away very fast, then Ranko's  
hand, as she licked it.  
  
---  
  
The Guide was still struggling with Genma about the hot water, when they  
both heard a low rumbling growl behind them. They turned slowly, and  
looked, and saw Neko-Ranko, crouching on the bed, growling. "Oh dear,"  
the Guide said, "This never never happen before." Genma jerked away,  
spilling the kettle, which by this time had grown cold, and turned into  
a panda. For a split second, the two stared at each other, then the  
panda turned and fled through the open door, not daring to look behind  
him.  
  
The Guide watched in stunned surprise, as the strangely behaving girl  
proceeded to lick her hand and use it to rub behind her ear, smoothing  
the hair back. She settled down, and purred at him. "Heh, heh. Nice  
kitty," he said, nervously, "that's a good kitty." He wanted to leap for  
the door as well, but he knew a sudden movement could well elicit a  
sudden reaction.   
  
He didn't know about the cat's claws, but he could well imagine the  
father's reaction, if he came back, and found the Guide pinned under his  
son/daughter. He doubted any amount of explaining would save him then,  
especially since he had not the foggiest clue how to explain this  
peculiar behavior. So he did not move an inch, not even when Neko-Ranko  
leapt lightly down, and brushed up against his leg, purring. When no  
caresses were forthcoming, she loped off in the direction Genma had  
gone.  
  
Genma, meanwhile, had run for several minutes, before glancing back, and  
realizing that he could see no signs of pursuit. The heavyset panda sat  
in a clearing, wondering what on earth had gone wrong with the boy. The  
Guide's explanation still ran through his head. Genma's form was an  
accident. But the boy had come and bathed in the Nyannichuan  
deliberately. Was it a ploy? Had the boy somehow found out about the  
seppeku pledge he had signed with Nodoka, forfeiting his life if he  
returned and Ranma was not a man among men? Could he possibly have  
learned of it and yet been unaware that Ranma would also have to commit  
seppeku? Who could have told him? Why else would he do it?  
  
Genma was still pondering this, when he noticed the forest around him  
had gone eerily silent. He was wondering what it meant up to the very  
moment that Neko-Ranko landed on top of him, knocking him to his back.  
He instantly went rigid, terribly afraid, remembering what those claws  
could do, and realizing that there was no way he could get away from  
Ranma before Ranma could slice him open. If Ranma really wanted him  
dead, then Genma was dead.  
  
But Neko-Ranko just stood there on top of Genma, then curled up on his  
chest, purring, and went to sleep. Ranma let Genma lie stiff with terror  
for nearly twenty minutes before asking Ranko if she wanted him to deal  
with Genma before she had to meet him. She nodded. "He deserves whatever  
you give him for what he did. But I never got a chance to know him, to  
have a father. I'd like to. Don't kill him if you don't have to. But  
make sure he understands I'm not you. I mean, I am, but not the way he  
would think it."  
  
After twenty minutes, Onna-Ranma's head lifted. "Hey, Oyaji. Long time,  
no see." he shifted, so that he was kneeling on his father's chest.  
Genma sat, stiff and scared. He could tell that Ranma had continued  
training... even his female body was lean and strong.   
  
"Why, boy. Why'd you do it?" Genma was terribly frightened of the  
answer, but he had to ask.  
  
"For Ranko." Genma just gaped. "For Ranko, Oyaji. You locked her in my  
mind, trapped her there with your training. Because of you, I can't free  
the Lady Alana." Genma gaped some more. Who the hell was Ranko, how had  
Genma's training had anything to do with her, and who the devil was Lady  
Alana? "I know you aren't capapable of really understanding this. Just  
look at it this way. You had a daughter." Genma shook his head  
frantically.   
  
"Don't shake your head at me old man. You are going to ACCEPT her as  
your daughter, got that?" He held out his hand and flicked his  
fingers out, and summoned Neko's chi claws, letting them hang there,  
visible. "I control the Nekoken now, Oyaji. I mastered it. Deny me this,  
and I'll flay you! Believe me, Ranko means far more to me than my  
worthless father, who drove his son mad." Genma nodded nervously. He had  
thought, for just a moment, to lapse back into the old ways of dealing  
with his son... but was stilled by the coldness he saw in his son's  
eyes. He looked in his son's eyes, and saw death, and at the same time,  
he was overwhelmed by a flood of pride. His biggest mistake, the stupid  
Neko-ken training, and his son had mastered it!   
  
"Ranko is your daughter. She's trapped in my mind. She ain't talking to  
you right now, understand. This is still me, Ranma. I went and got this  
body, so she could be comfortable when I let her out. You make her  
uncomfortable about it, and I'm gonna make me some panda sausage. You  
got that?" Genma nodded vociferously, fear lurking in his dark eyes.  
  
"Alright, I'm gonna get up now. You run, and I'll hunt you down. You  
stand up, and wait right here. I'm gonna get Ranko, and let her talk to  
you. I say again, you hurt her, and you're sausage meat."   
  
Onna-Ranma stood up slowly and stepped back. Panda-Genma stood equally  
slowly. Onna-Ranma said, "You can't meet her like that." He pointed his  
arm at Genma, and a thin stream of hot water sprayed out of a previously  
invisible opening in his sleeve, hitting the old man in the chest,   
returning him to his human form.   
  
"Hey, if you can do that, why aren't you turning back," Genma demanded.  
He didn't really understand what Ranma was going on about, and wasn't  
sure whether to believe his son, and now that he was human, and  
standing, he felt much more comfortable, ready to defend himself. He  
might have to unseal the forbidden techniques, but he could tame his  
wild son again.  
  
"I told you old man," Onna-Ranma replied, popping her chi claws out  
again, and slicing the air with them, "You're here to meet her. You  
think she wants to meet you wearing my skin? Now shut up and wait." Her  
claws disappeared, and her eyes turned blank, then sparkled again.   
  
Genma stared, as the solid fury of Onna-Ranma seemed to melt into  
diffidence. Ranko dug her foot into the ground, looking down. "Uhm....  
Its nice to meet you, Genma-san." She looked up at him with kawaii  
eyes, big and blue and glistening with tears. "I never had a father.  
Will you be my father, Genma-san?" Genma nodded slowly, wonder and awe  
in his eyes. What was going on here? Ranko smiled suddenly, and Genma  
felt as if the whole clearing had been lit up, and then it didn't matter  
what was wrong with Ranma. He had a little girl, and she was hugging  
him, him, her father. He slowly hugged her back, wondering what on earth  
he was doing. Then again, as he thought further on it... Ranko might  
well be his key to controlling the strong and independent young man his  
son had become. Maybe he could extract some information from her, start  
planning his next move...  
  
"R-R... Ranko, dear," he began, looking down at her, "Ranma said he  
mastered the cat-fist." She nodded happily, grinning up at him. "But,  
but... in the hut... You were acting like a cat."   
  
"No Papa-san," she said, and he felt his heart swell again, to hear this  
beautiful little girl call him Papa, "That wasn't me, that was Neko.  
Ranma has mastered the cat-fist, and because he has, I have." She  
stepped back, and waggled her fingers, chi-claws playfully slashing the  
air before vanishing, "but Neko's still in there, and he wants to come  
out and play sometimes. You will let me keep him, won't you Papa-san?"  
She begged him, eyes huge and glistening, just as if she was talking  
about an adorable little kitten. Genma melted again. He could never  
refuse a kawaii little girl such a simple thing... especially if keeping  
her happy could restore his control over Ranma. Heh.  
  
"Of course, Ranko, of course," he reassured her, patting her shoulder  
akwardly. She could display affection so easily, but it had never been  
easy for Genma, nor was it easy for Ranma.   
  
"Papa-san?" she asked, looking up to him.  
  
"Yes, Ranko-chan?"   
  
"I know why Ranma came here, to this place. He came for me. But why are  
you here?"  
  
"Oh, Ranko," and tears started trickling down his face, "I waited and  
searched for him for so long. But I never found him. I wanted to go home  
and face your mother, but I was afraid. So I kept on going with the  
trip. I tried to go to all the places I would have taken Ranma,  
pretending he was still with me. I had to send postcards to your mother,  
you see, or she would have been suspicious. This would have been the  
last training ground, the last place we would have come, before  
returning to Japan. Now I see that it would have been a huge mistake.  
But not as big as my trying to teach Ranma the Neko-ken in the first  
place. I thought I had lost him." He broke down sobbing, and collapsed  
to the ground. Ranko held him, soothing him, rocking him back and forth,  
until the tears finally stopped. "And now... and now I've got him  
back.... and I've got you... and Neko, I guess... but I can't go  
home again. Oh Ranma, I'm so sorry."   
  
Ranko looked down at him. "Why, Papa-san? I want to meet my mother. I  
know Ranma misses her, too. Why can't we go back?"   
  
"Oh, Ranma, Ranko, how I've failed you. When we left, I had to sign a  
pledge, before Nodoka would let me take you. It said that if when we  
returned, Ranma was not a man among men, we would both commit seppeku.  
So you see, we cannot go home."   
  
"But Ranma is a man among men. Not only that, he is the Lord of Fey  
Castle," Ranko replied. She was confused... why was her father assuming  
that Ranma was not a man?  
  
"The what? The Lord? My son's a Lord of a castle? Where? Where is the  
castle?" Genma asked, excitedly.   
  
"Its back on the world we went to, the world we were summoned to."   
Genma's face twitched. His eyes betrayed his utter confusion.  
"Look Papa-san, the reason you couldn't find  
Ranma was that he wasn't in Japan anymore. He was on a different world.  
He was summoned there by a powerful sorcerer." Genma twitched again.  
"He defeated the sorcerer, and so he owns all the  
lands and power the sorcerer had, and the heart of Lady Alana." Genma  
fell over, twitching.   
  
"The Lady? He's married?"   
  
"No, no, Papa-san. He's not married. But I guess you might call her his  
fiancee, maybe. Certainly she loves him. But he is doing all he can to  
set her free. That's why he's here." Genma fainted. Ranko sighed, then  
hefted Genma across her shoulders, and trotted back to the Guide's hut.  
When she got there, she found the Guide in a heated discussion in  
Mandarin with a little old crone with a staff as tall as she was... all  
of three feet. The crone turned as Ranko emerged from the brush. trotted  
up to them. The crone's eyes sparkled as she watched Ranko carefully   
set Genma on the ground.  
  
Kho Lon watched the girl. She was quite strong, that was clear. She  
had no difficulty swinging the man down, so her strength was not just in  
her legs and back, but in her arms as well. She had a relatively low ki  
level compared to the norm for warriors in the village, but her corded  
muscles showed promise. She moved easily and lithely, with a fluid  
grace.   
  
Kho Lon found it difficult to credit the Guide's story. A young man   
dunked into the Nyannichuan should not move so much like a girl.  
Especially this early after the change, he should not be so completely  
at ease in that body. This girl had apparently had no difficulty with  
her change in height, her differing distance from the ground as she  
slung the old man down, nor the difference in how her hips moved and  
where her center of gravity was as she had trotted across the field.   
  
This girl was definitely a girl... which meant the Nannichuan, and a  
lying Guide. Yet Kho Lon would have sworn that the Guide believed his  
words. This meant that the girl must have done something to the Guide,  
which was extremely disturbing. Kho Lon had fallen silent as the strange  
girl approached, not sure whether to credit the Guide's claim that the  
young man had spoken perfect Mandarin, given the girl's clearly Japanese  
features. Red hair was certainly uncommon for the Japanese, but her face  
was clearly Japanese.  
  
"Greetings, Honored Elder," Ranko said in perfect Mandarin,  
turning to face Kho Lon, and bowing deeply to the old woman, then  
turned back to the guide, "Greetings, Honored Guide. May I have my  
pack?"  
  
The Guide turned nervously towards the old lady, who nodded  
imperceptibly, then nodded and went into the hut, returning in a moment  
with Ranma's pack. "Here you are, young man," he said, handing it to  
her.   
  
She looked at him strangely for a moment, then a light of realization  
went off in her eyes. "Oh, no sir, I am not a young man." She bowed  
again to both, "I am Saotome Ranko." Kho Lon gave the Guide a sharp  
glance, and he blanched. Ranko giggled as she turned to the Guide.  
"Ranma is sleeping with the cat."  
  
I must know more about this, Kho Lon thought, I must get her to stay  
with us for a while. "Child, you must be tired after your journey.  
Please come with me, and accept my hospitality."  
  
Ranko looked at her for a moment, then looked at her sleeping father,  
"Can I bring Papa-san?"  
  
"Yes, of course, child."   
  
"Um...," she paused, as a memory of the Lady's description of the area,  
and its dangers, came back to her, "are you Joketsuzoku, Honored  
Elder?"  
  
"Yes, child. You have heard of us?" she asked, and glared again at the  
Guide, who shook his head desperately, trying to convey that he had said  
nothing. Kho Lon knew well enough what he intended, but held him pierced  
by the gaze for a moment longer, to remind him of his place.  
  
"Yes, Honored Elder. I have heard of the laws regarding combat and  
outsiders. I am too young to marry, Honored Elder, and I do not wish to  
die, and Ranma, well, he sort of already has a fiancee."   
  
By this point, Ranma had awoken, and retorted [I do not have a fiancee,  
Red.]  
  
[But Ranma, surely you cannot become involved with another woman until  
you have freed Lady Alana? Until you do that, you are tied as tightly as  
if betrothed, are you not?]  
  
[...sigh... yes, Red, you're right. Of course. Thanks. I definitely  
don't need Amazon trouble.]  
  
Kho Lon was very surprised that this young sprout knew of the Amazon  
laws, and bitterly disappointed. She would have made such a perfect  
Amazon. Perhaps it was still not too late? "Very well then, child. I  
will take you under my protection. As long as you stay with me, you will  
be an honorary Amazon, and if a challenge comes, it shall be under the  
same laws that govern any challenge between Amazons. If you win a  
marriage challenge, then it will be your choice to marry or not."  
  
"Oh, then I'd love to come, Honored Elder. But will my brother be under  
your protection, too?"  
  
"Your brother," she asked, looking around, "of course, but where is he?"   
  
"And my cat, will he be under your protection too?" she persisted.  
  
"Yes, yes." I can't believe I'm promising to protect a cat.  
  
"And my Papa-san?"  
  
Kho Lon sighed. "Yes, child."  
  
"Oh, goody," she giggled, before bending over, grabbing Genma, and  
slinging him across her backpack. "Lead on, Honored Elder."  
  
Kho Lon watched her sling the heavyset older man lightly on her  
shoulders, and recognizing that both the pack and the man must each by  
themselves weigh more than she did, decided that she was indeed worth  
the trouble. 


	3. The Amazons

The Amazons  
  
  
So Kho Lon led off. As she walked, she considered some of what she had  
seen. Kho Lon was a great martial artist... but the Joketsuzoku also had  
many magical artifacts, and Kho Lon knew many spells. Most were potions  
and the like, but one was verbal, and she subvocalized it now. It was a  
vital spell to her community, for it allowed her to see the emanations  
of powerful magic, in the same way that powerful martial artists can see  
ki. Having cast it, she looked back at Ranko, and stopped short.  
  
Ranko came up beside her, and looked down at her, worriedly. Kho Lon  
didn't really notice her expression. She was too busy trying to suppress  
the look of sheer awe on her own. The girl was glowing so brilliantly it  
was almost hard to look at her. Her very skin glowed, more so than could  
be accounted for by the curse alone, telling Kho Lon that the girl was a  
sorceress. But more than that, every single item on her, with the sole  
exception of Genma, who merely glowed with the light tint of Jusenkyo,  
fairly shone out with the brilliance given off by only the strongest  
magic items.   
  
Kho Lon, realizing that she had stopped and was staring, and that Ranko  
had asked her several times what was wrong, snapped, "Nothing." and  
turned and stalked off, banishing the spell. What was wrong with her,  
becoming impressed with a little razzle dazzle... No, she couldn't lie  
to herself. Ranko was a find like no other. A brilliant sorceress  
clothed in magical glory, and yet somehow an excellent martial artist.  
If the dimbulb Guide was to be believed, it sounded like she might  
even have mastered the Neko-ken.  
  
No guard stopped them at the gate, but Kho Lon took keen notice of the  
fact that Ranko's eyes had flicked to each guard's location, in spite of  
their skill at hiding, and the fact that they had not moved the whole  
time they were in sight. She even glanced towards the one was completely  
out of sight. Kho Lon decided she must be sensing their ki, since she  
herself had not felt the girl cast a spell. How the girl's ki could be  
so low, and yet she be skilled enough to detect auras, Kho Lon wasn't  
sure. Perhaps she was suppressing her aura? Kho Lon resisted the impulse  
to chortle with delight. What a find! What a find!   
  
She led the girl through the village to her home, delighting in the  
envious stares of the other elders, who could sense some of the worth of  
her find, the lustful sidelong glances of the men, and some of the women  
as well, and the appraising looks of the other young warriors.   
  
As she entered her home, she enjoyed the delight young Ranko showed in  
admiring the construction and design, and the decoration as they  
entered. Xian Pu was not in the home. She was probably out practicing  
somewhere, or beating off the attentions of Mu Suu. No, that wasn't  
right... Mu Suu was still out visiting his relatives, and wouldn't be  
back for another week.  
  
Ranko slid off her Papa-san, laying him on the floor, then slid off her  
pack. She sank into a chair, then gratefully took the cup of tea that  
Kho Lon offered her. "Honored Elder, I thank you for taking me into your  
home. If you don't mind... my brother wishes to speak with you  
privately. Is that alright?"  
  
"Of course, my child." Kho Lon half-expected what was going to happen,  
since the girl had insisted on protection for her brother and cat, yet  
brought neither with them. She simply wasn't certain yet how real this  
was. Was it an act, or insanity, or something magical? She did not know.  
But she was very surprised when with a light application of ki, Ranko  
suddenly became male.   
  
She had expected to be asked for a glass of water, or hot water, if the  
Guide had been right. To change with just an application of ki implied  
either an unprecedented mastery of ki, or much longer experience with  
the curse than the Guide had indicated. It also didn't tell her whether  
she was right about the girl really being a girl or not. Certainly,  
the girl looked uncomfortable in her male form, almost timid. She had  
just about decided she was right, when the girl's eyes went completely  
blank, then suddenly shone again, hard with dark glints, where the  
girl's eyes had been happy and full of light.   
  
The color wasn't different, really... just the expression. Suddenly  
the lack of comfort with the body was wholly and completely gone. She  
was once again facing someone who was completely and totally familiar  
with his body. Immediately she thought of him as a he. It was  
impossible not to.  
  
"Honored Elder," and the voice was deeper and rougher, as expected, but  
also far harder, not something she expected at all from the  
light-hearted little darling she had been sitting across from, "Ranko  
has never had the opportunity to live with others before. And for a  
time, I am going to give her that opportunity without watching over her  
shoulder. She needs this, to understand and live this. Before I can  
begin to accept her, she must accept herself as real. So I am going to  
go, and live with the cat, and try to learn from him, and train him. In  
the meantime, she will be here with you. I put her in your care. If harm  
should befall her, physical, mental, or emotional, I will destroy the  
Joketsuzoko. I say this as the Lord of Fey Castle, Archmage of the Court  
of Farallon, GrandMaster of the Fey school of Anything Goes Martial  
Arts, Wielder of Dragon Fang... if harm befall my sister while I  
am away, I will return, and the Joketsuzoku will fall."  
  
Cologne sat in silence through his little speech. She might have  
objected, might have argued his claim to the ability to destroy the  
Joketsuzoku, were it not for the fact that the very moment the eyes had  
come to life again, she had felt his ki surge before he brought it under  
control... and it had surged beyond even her own, and she had not felt  
it peak... she had felt him rein it in. At the same time, she had   
recognized his absolute faith in the truth of his words.   
  
"You may make her an honorary Amazon, but she will not be bound by your  
laws. If she cannot be bound by the laws of nature, and boundaries of  
this world, your laws are as nothing. Do not try and entrap her. I warn  
you, Kho Lon."   
  
She felt a shiver go through her. She was certain she had never given  
the girl her name, nor had anyone in the village greeted her by name.  
How had he known!? "If she chooses to train with you, or to train you,  
or to fight beside you, that is her choice. But if she comes to harm,  
whether by your action or your inaction, your people will die, by my  
love for her. Tell me that we have an understanding, Kho Lon, and I will  
return, and leave her to you." Kho Lon would swear the temperature in  
the room steadily dropping.  
  
"Yes, Lord Fey," she stammered, furious at being so flustered, yet  
struck with an unreasoning fear for her people. She could not help but  
believe that he could do as he said, "it will be as you say."  
  
She felt the gentle application of ki, and marveled that he transitioned  
back with hardly a hundredth of the ki his sister had used. His eyes  
went dark again, flat and empty, and then brightened and shone, and she  
giggled, and then looked across at Kho Lon, who shivered.  
  
"Oh, Honored Elder, was he mean? He was mean to Papa-san too. I wish he  
wouldn't be so mean, but he just loves me so much, and he feels guilty  
for not letting me out before." She smiled, and the room brightened.  
Kho Lon breathed more easily. The danger was gone. She would protect  
this girl with her life, she knew that now. Her life was worth less than  
the Joketsuzoku, and so Ranko's life was worth more than her own.  
  
Ranma, for his part, was silently blessing the lessons in diplomacy he  
had taken at the Mage Towers, and the experience with the Soul of Ice  
that gave him the ability to project such a cold demeanor.  
  
As Kho Lon got out the chess board, and they started playing, Ranko took  
up a conversation with Ranma.  
  
[Ranma. I need to tell you something.]  
  
[Yes, Red-chan?]  
  
[We've got two problems, Ranma, and I think I know a way to fix both of  
them.]  
  
[Really? What's that?]  
  
[As soon as I got in this body, I extended our senses, to feel the  
magic... Ranma, I can't see the threads in the Dragon Fang. Well, I can,  
but they're faint.]  
  
[Maybe you're just not used to it yet?]  
  
[No, no, you don't understand. I looked at Kho Lon, and I can see her  
power just fine.]  
  
[Oh! You can see feminine magic! That's wonderful... but wait... no...  
I can't reach out with my senses from here. I can't see the magic when  
I'm inside...]  
  
[That's what I'm trying to get at, Ranma. You need to find a way. First,  
you need to find a way to get out of this body. Maybe your ki aura? It  
took on nearly substantial form when you were with the lions... and  
then you made it real with magic. If you could do something like that,  
so that we were in two different bodies, then maybe we could work  
together to free the Lady!]  
  
[Yeah, wow...]  
  
[And if you make me a body...] Now her mental voice was timid. [We could  
go meet Mama-san together? And you wouldn't be a girl at all, you'd be a  
man among men, just like she wanted, so she wouldn't need to be mad at  
Papa-san, and we could be a family?] Her voice pleaded with him, and he  
could see her kawaii eyes in his mind.  
  
[All right, Red-chan. You can stay here with the Amazon's, until I can  
make you a body. But I'm gonna have to talk to Kho Lon again, and this  
time I'm gonna have to face their Council. You remember what the Lady  
said about the politics here. If I'm not gonna be here to protect you,  
then I'm just gonna have to scare them good, so they'll protect you.]  
  
[Oh, thank you, Ranma. I love you.]  
  
[I love you too, Red-chan.]  
  
---  
  
Xian Pu was annoyed again... her private practice had been interrupted.  
She tried to force the annoyance down, and focused on being happy, and  
working at it a bit, she succeeded. She had a lot of practice at this.  
She was the top young warrior in the village, and it was a lonely  
position. Most of the other young women were distant to her, disliking  
the way she drew their boyfriends' eyes. It didn't help that so many of  
their boyfriends had tried to date Xian Pu, only to end up beaten by Mu  
Suu. So she had neither many girl friends, nor a good prospect for a  
boyfriend. She had liked Mu Suu, when they were both younger, and had  
even defended him when he was picked on due to his inferior eyesight.  
Ever since that day, he had adored her, and made her life a misery.  
  
The elders detested depressed or angry young women, for they would   
quickly spread their depression or anger to others, so Xian Pu had  
learned early how to be happy in the face of pain. As she entered the  
village, she noticed the increased gossip, and looked for someone who  
would be willing to tell her. Seeing Li Te, she called to her, and ran  
over. "What is everyone so excited about, Li?"  
  
"Xian Pu, your great-grandmother came in about an hour ago. She had gone  
to see the Guide at Jusenkyo, and she came back with an outsider."  
  
"An outsider? Is it a man? Is he cute? Is he strong?"  
  
"No, no, Xian, it was a young woman. She was strong. She was carrying a  
pack and another outsider, and both looked heavier than she was. And she  
had fiery red hair."  
  
"Why would great-grandmother bring an outsider female in? Was the man  
she was carrying handsome?"  
  
"Oh, no, he was a fat old man. Bald too, I think, though he had a cloth  
on his head so I can't be sure."  
  
"Ewww. Why would a young redhead want an old bald man?"  
  
"I don't know. Why are you still here asking me questions? Kho Lon  
brought the outsider into your home. They haven't come out since. Go in,  
and find out, and then tell me first."  
  
Xian Pu thanked her, then ran through the village, calling out greetings  
as she passed people, dodging playing children and dogs, and leapt up  
the stairs in front of her home. She paused outside the door, taking a  
moment to collect herself, and ensure she looked alright, before opening  
the door and stepping in.   
  
She was intrigued by the sight of her great-grandmother playing chess   
with an amazingly cute little redhead, while an ugly old man cowered in  
the corner, trying not to be noticed. "Great-Grandmother, I'm home."  
  
"I know dear. Have a seat." Kho Lon waited until Xian Pu took a seat,  
quivering with excitement. "Xian Pu, this is Saotome Ranko. Ranko, this  
is my great-grandaughter, Xian Pu."   
  
"Its nice to meet you, Xian Pu," said Ranko, in remarkably unaccented  
Mandarin. Not quite the local dialect, but perfectly understandable.   
  
"Nice to meet you too. You are from Japan, Ranko? Where did you learn  
to speak Mandarin so well?" Xian Pu asked. She wondered if this little  
goddess had a brother. She looked perfectly edible.  
  
"The Dragon Lady taught us." Ranko replied absently, at which Kho Lon  
looked up sharply. Before Kho Lon could ask, Xian Pu had spoken again,  
quivering in her excitement.  
  
"Us? You said us? Who is us? You and the old man?" She asked, pointing  
to the corner.  
  
"No, not me and Papa-san, my brother and I," Ranko replied. Kho Lon  
sighed softly, as Xian Pu broke into a huge smile. The little goddess  
had a brother! Oh but surely her brother could not look as perfect as  
her.   
  
"Where is your brother?" asked Xian Pu, eagerly, again before Kho Lon  
could get a word in edgewise. Kho Lon considered rapping her  
granddaughter on the head, but she wondered how Ranko would answer...  
and she really wouldn't mind if Xian Pu managed to snag Ranma. Dangerous  
he might be, but that just made him a better catch.  
  
"Oh, he's training with the cat," Ranko replied.   
  
Xian Pu could barely contain her eagerness now. Training... that meant  
he was a martial artist... and she wanted to watch. Oh, how she wanted  
to watch. "Where is he? I want to watch him. Come on, let's go watch."  
She was bubbling over with excitement, and leapt to her feet, reaching  
for Ranko's hand.  
  
But Ranko pulled back. "We can't."  
  
"But why not?" Xian Pu's face fell. She almost felt like crying. So  
close... she knew he would be perfect.  
  
"He isn't here. Wait... Maybe... Honored Elder, do you have a large  
basin that we could fill with water?"  
  
"Of course, child," and Kho Lon wandered off to get it, noticing again  
that she still hadn't told the child her name, and the child still  
didn't seem to know it, even though Ranma had. Or perhaps the child was  
just being polite.  
  
She returned with the basin, and a large flask, which she emptied into  
it. Ranko gestured to them, "Ok, now look into the water." She muttered  
a few words, and flicked her fingers, and suddenly the surface of the  
water was a hard clear image. "Oohh, cool, it worked!" She giggled,  
delighted at her success. Xian Pu would have given her a funny look, but  
she was entranced by the vision in the water.   
  
Ranko was disguising her inner delight. She had needed to do this, to  
prove to herself that she was right, that she wasn't just doing this for  
Papa-san. She felt good now. She could see the threads of magic, and had  
drawn them up and cast a scrying magic, and it had been easy. She was  
right. They would be able to free the lady together. She smiled at the  
image. Ranma was showing off for her. He wanted to make her look good,  
to impress them.  
  
Ranma stood in the middle of a grove, his shirt off, while Neko-Ranma  
crouched a few feet away. A blue glow was visible around Neko-Ranma.  
Ranma shifted from complete stillness, to sudden motion, flowing into a  
powerful kata, and Xian Pu sighed in happiness. He was a god, just like  
his sister. He was beautiful and he was perfect... and why were there  
two of him, and why was one now acting like a cat?   
  
Neko-Ranma would crouch for a moment, then pounce at Ranma, trying to  
knock him out of the kata. Ranma would shift ever so slightly, and use  
Neko-Ranma's momentum to push himself into the next phase of the kata.  
This continued, faster and faster, until they were hardly visible.  
Xian Pu heard a muffled sob behind her, and glared back to see Genma  
standing, eyes wide in awe, shamed that he had not been the one to  
train Ranma to such greatness... and momentarily uncertain that he would  
ever be able to bend such a one to his will. No, the boy was his son,  
his blood, he would never give him up!   
  
Ranko just said happily, "At least they aren't tearing up the grove.   
Ooops, spoke too soon." Kho Lon, Genma, and Xian Pu gasped as  
Ranma's assist to Neko-Ranma's momentum carried him into a tree, claws  
outstretched, slicing through the four foot thick trunk. It fell towards  
Ranma, and they all held their breath, then watched in awe as the  
portion in Ranma's vicinity puffed into sawdust as he failed to so much  
as slow in his Kata.   
  
Finally, he came to an abrupt halt, and Xian Pu breathed out in  
admiration at his finely muscled form. He dropped gracefully into lotus  
position, and Neko-Ranma came up to him, and crawled into his lap. No  
sound had passed through the water, but Xian Pu could see his chest  
clearly, and saw that though he was sweating, he was not even breathing  
hard after that remarkable display.   
  
"Amazing," she breathed, but then considered again, "Why are there two  
of him? And where is he?"  
  
"Oh," Ranko replied, "There's not two of him. This one is Ranma," and  
she pointed to the seated figure, "and this one is Neko. And they're...   
well, nowhere really."  
  
"Huh?" was Xian Pu's remarkably intelligent response.  
  
"Well, I mean, there... where they are, that doesn't really exist."  
  
Xian Pu almost sobbed, "Ranma's not real?! Why did you show me that if  
he's not real. He was so perfect." Then she did break into tears. The  
perfect man, and he was just a dream.  
  
"Oh, no Xian Pu, I didn't say that. Please don't cry. Ranma's real. He's  
as real as I am. I just said, that there, where he is, that place, that  
isn't real. You can't go there. Only he and I and Neko can get there,"  
Ranko said, laying a hand on Xian Pu.  
  
Xian Pu looked up, startled. "You mean, he can come here?"  
  
"Well, yes, he could. If he wanted to. But he wants me to be here for  
now. He wants me to get used to this, used to reality, used to people,  
for a while," replied Ranko, gesturing widely around her.  
  
Kho Lon finally saw her opportunity. "Ranko, dear, I will tell Xian Pu  
about Ranma. Could you tell me... what did you mean earlier about being  
taught Mandarin by the 'Dragon Lady'?" Genma perked up. Neither Ranma  
nor Ranko had mentioned a Dragon Lady, had they?   
  
"I mean she taught us, Ranma and I. She said we would need it. I don't  
know how she knew."  
  
"Yes, yes, I understand that. What I mean, is, why do you call her the  
Dragon Lady?"  
  
"I'm sorry. Its just that I didn't have a name for so long, that they  
didn't mean much to me. So I think of people differently. I meant Lady  
Alana."  
  
Genma gasped, "Ranma's fiancee?"   
  
Xian Pu sobbed again, "He's already promised?"  
  
Kho Lon said sharply, "Yes, but why, dear child, do you call her the  
'Dragon Lady'? Why do you think of her that way?"  
  
"Oh! Well, because she's a dragon of course," Ranko replied brightly.  
Xian Pu, Kho Lon, and Genma promptly fell over.  
  
"And how, child, did your brother come to be affianced to a dragon?" Kho  
Lon asked sharply, glaring at the child's father. His fault, she was  
sure.  
  
"Oh, well, you see, we were summoned by this evil man, and he wanted us  
to kill this other guy, but we were Neko at the time, so we killed the  
evil man, and all his stuff sorta decided we were next, and we fought  
his clothes and lost and fell asleep, and this beautiful lady came and  
called us Master, and so we buried the guy we killed, and now she loves  
Ranma, and he's come here to accept me so he can set her free,"  
explained Ranko happily, to the complete and utter confusion of the  
others. "Oh, heck, I can see you don't understand. Maybe I better get  
Ranma to explain it?" she asked, querulously.   
  
"Oh yes," breathed Xian Pu, "Ranma!"   
  
"Uhm, Ok, let me get him," Ranko said, nervously eyeing Xian Pu, who  
looked disturbingly hungry. [Brother dear... could you come explain Lady  
Alana to Honored Elder, please? I can't make them understand, I don't  
know how to explain it. Can I watch you explain it?]  
  
[Yes, Ranko darling. Change for me, will you?] Kho Lon again observed  
that Ranko needed to apply considerably more ki than Ranma had to  
activate the change. She also noticed Genma's awestruck gaze, and   
realized that he had not the foggiest clue how it had been done. Indeed,  
she suddenly realized, if it could be controlled, even in the presence  
of water, Jusenkyou might suddenly become remarkably useful to the  
Joketsuzoku. She wondered whether Ranma and Ranko could resist the  
change when splashed.   
  
She also noticed her Xian Pu's sudden increased heart rate, and heavy  
breathing. She was clearly smitten with the boy, after having watched  
him work out. Well, it would be to the good, if she could catch him. But  
she would have to be warned against using esoteric methods. He would  
likely catch on and be wroth. Kho Lon experienced a sudden chill at the  
thought of an angry Ranma. She watched the eyes, and saw the change.  
  
"I have not been introduced to you, my dear," he said, turning to Xian  
Pu, then looking at Kho Lon. Best to give Kho Lon a carrot, as well as a  
stick. If she thought her child might catch him, she might be more  
amenable to aiding Ranko. He'd have to make sure they didn't try  
anything funny though.  
  
"This is my great-granddaughter, Xian Pu," Kho Lon said with pride.  
  
"Nice to meet you, Xian Pu," he responded, smiling at her. She felt  
her heart melt and puddle in her feet. He was so gorgeous, and strong,   
and skilled... "It is a whim of my sister to call this an engagement,"  
he stated baldly, causing Xian Pu's heart to flutter. Did he mean he was  
free? "But it is a useful fiction. Certainly she is tied to me, by bonds  
of love and magic, due to the ensorcellment of the man I killed, while  
under the Neko-ken."   
  
He paused to glare menacingly at Genma, who shrank back. "As a result, I  
am now Lord of Fey Castle. It is my responsibility to see that no harm  
comes to Lady Alana. One way in which harm may come to her, is for her  
to see me in the arms of another, or for me to leave her for too long. I  
was forced to put her under a spell, to stop time for her, so to speak,  
while I seek to undue the damage my father's training did to my mind."  
  
Again he glared at Genma, and was joined by the hard stares of the two  
women, before whom Genma quailed and shook. "When my task here is  
complete, I will return to her and free her. I do not know what she will  
do. She is a dragon, as my sister said, and I am not privy to the  
workings of the minds of dragons. It may be, that after I free her, she  
will slay me out of hand. I do not know. It is said that dragons can be  
callous. I hope it be not so, but until the Lady Alana be free, I can  
consider myself bound by no other tie. Even be it one made before I were  
born." He stared at Genma, who truly shivered this time. How could the  
boy know? There was no way, there was no possible way Ranma could have  
learned of the promise he and Tendo Soun had made, before any of their  
children were born, to join their houses. Was there?   
  
Ranma turned his gaze again to Kho Lon. He had given her the carrot,  
explained why he had been cold, and given her reason to think he might  
be catchable once his goal was achieved. Now it was time to show them a  
really big stick. "Before I return my sister to you, I would speak to  
your council. I have considered, and I know that politics can be a  
difficult thing. I do not wish to place you in the position of trying to  
defend my sister from those who know not the real consequences of their  
actions. I will speak to them," and his voice grew cold and hard, "and  
they will listen."  
  
Then he turned to Xian Pu, and he smiled, and the room lightened, and  
Xian Pu felt her heart beat faster. "And you," and he took her hand, and  
she felt faint. His hand was strong and his tendons moving beneath the  
skin felt like taut steel cables. "My sister has never had a friend  
before. If you can find it within yourself to be that for her, I will  
reward you." From thin air, he plucked a crystal rose, green-stemmed,  
with brilliant red petals, and placed it in her hand. She sighed, and  
looked at it, and pretended to smell it, then looked up in shock. It  
smelled real!   
  
She sighed, and sniffed her rose prettily, and smiled at him. She had  
long known that she had little hope of finding a strong husband in the  
tribe and she had hoped for the chance to find an outsider, who would be  
strong and skilled and handsome, and here he sat before her, and for  
him, she would be the best friend that Ranko would ever have. She still  
did not understand the connection between them... She thought that Ranma  
must know magic. She did not even consider Jusenkyou, as there had been  
no water involved. Jusenkyou required water to change.  
  
He stood, suddenly, and looked at Kho Lon. "Gather your council. I will  
speak to them ere I return. I want to do it now, while Ranko is absorbed  
with Neko." He stepped to the door and was gone outside. Kho Lon  
followed, as did Xian Pu and Genma. Ranma stood just outside the door,  
yet somehow he had found time, in that instant of movement, to change,  
and now he wore golden armor, moulded to his curves, and a high helm  
with a tall plume, and carried a sword at his side. Truly he looked the  
part of the lord of a castle, and surely he was incongruous, looking as  
such, standing by the door of a home in a small village. Kho Lon hurried  
off, bouncing on her staff, to gather the council.   
  
Xian Pu noticed with annoyance the swift gathering of a crowd of  
admiring young warriors, hunger in their eyes. She wanted to stake her  
claim, but could not do so, for she knew that to try to claim Ranma  
before he had fulfilled his given word to the Dragon Lady would anger  
him. He stood motionless for a moment, then sighed. "Xian Pu, how long  
does the council usually take to gather?" he asked her, looking up, blue  
eyes shining beneath the glittering helm.  
  
"Sometimes, it can take an hour or more," she replied. Her voice was  
strong, and did not reveal her fear... somehow she did not want to anger  
him. He merely sighed again. "In that case, Xian Pu, is there a place  
where I can practice?" Her heart filled with desire. So soon after  
he had given such a performance, and he wanted to practice again?  
What stamina! She led him quickly to a practice field, followed by  
nearly every eligible woman who was out and about the village that day.  
  
He stood there in silence for a moment, and she could see how his  
awareness of the crowd, and even of her, faded from his mind, and she  
was saddened for a moment that she could so easily be forgotten. That  
sadness disappeared the moment he began to move. He flowed so easily  
through the kata, even though he was wearing heavy armor. Now his  
sword slid from his sheath with utter silence, and she realized with awe  
that though he was now doing sword katas in the heavy sun and chill,  
thin mountain air, wearing heavy armor, he was totally silent.  
  
After nearly an hour, as he continuously moved through the katas,  
steadily increasing his speed, he was moving so fast that there were  
regular cracks in the air as one limb or another broke the sound  
barrier. Xian Pu knew that Great-Grandmother could do that with the  
Kachuu Tenshin Amaguriken, the Chestnut Fist, but he had been doing it  
steadily for several minutes now, and showed no signs of slowing, nor  
even signs of strain.   
  
Kho Lon pogoed up beside her and stopped, balancing easily on her staff.  
"He moves well," she said quietly to her daughter.  
  
"He moves like a kami," Xian Pu replied softly.  
  
"The council is ready," Kho Lon stated aloud, and the crowd gasped as  
Ranma came to instant stillness, in what should have been an untenable  
position. After a moment, he relaxed, and came towards her.   
  
"Good. I would speak to them. Lead me there." The crowd gasped again,  
and murmurs arose. Even such as he, he was still a man, how could he  
speak to a Matriarch that way, and why did she allow it? She led him in  
silence, ignoring the whispers among the warriors, to a large, long  
building, and inside. Xian Pu did not follow, but returned to her home,  
to await the results. She hoped fervently that the council would not be  
harsh to him for his behavior. He was so perfect, it would be a shame to  
waste such perfection. It did not really occur to her to consider that  
his demonstration might mean that they would have little choice on what  
to do with him. She had been raised on the doctrine of Amazon  
superiority.  
  
---  
  
"Kho Lon," one of the elders demanded, "What is this about? Why have you  
called us together just to show us some outsider? And a mere male.  
Hmmph." Murmurs of agreement rippled through the seated elders.  
  
"Sisters," Kho Lon replied, "Before you consider too harshly my actions,  
be aware that this man is betrothed to a dragon."  
  
"Enough, Kho Lon," Ranma stated, "I can speak for myself."  
  
There were shocked whispers, and then one voice rang out, "Silence,  
fool, you have no standing here. Let Kho Lon convince us to listen to  
you, and hold your tongue."  
  
"You hold your tongue, Old Woman!" his voice rang out sharply, to harsh  
whispers, and several outcries, but he did not pause nor falter, "Lest  
there remain nothing standing in the valley of the Joketsuzoku." He  
released his hold on his aura, and it filled the room, touching each  
elder, shocking them into silence. When next he spoke, it was with a  
voice filled with ki, and it echoed through the hall and in their  
hearts, "I am Lord Ranma Fey, Lord and Master of Fey Castle, Archmage to  
the Court of Farallon, GrandMaster of the Fey School of Anything Goes  
Martial Arts, Wielder of the Dragon Fang," and here he drew his sword,  
and it glowed a bright golden in the light of his ki, "and Beloved of  
the Dragon Alana. I come before to warn you, lest you act in haste, and  
doom your people. My sister has been invited to stay amongst you. Any  
harm that you do to her, you do to me, and I will repay it a  
thousand-fold. If she comes to harm while staying with you, the  
Joketsuzoku will be a forgotten memory."   
  
The whispers remained silent now, every member of the council was in awe  
of the power of his aura, and those who could sense magic were in awe of  
the might of his sword. "Teach her, and learn from her what you may, and  
when I return to take her away, I will consider what you have done. And  
if you have pleased me, then I may offer you the friendship of the House  
of Fey, a safe bastion of retreat and a source of great might of arms at  
need. But my sister and I are not yours, nor shall we ever be, and if  
someone from the Amazons win my heart or my sister's, it is they who  
will become Fey, and not I nor my sister Amazon. Remember that well, and  
perhaps in the future I will consider mingling the blood of the Fey with  
that of your own. Be aware, as well... My sister and I share the same  
body. I have taken on a Jusenkyou curse, to give her her own. So if you  
see me about your village, and think to speak to me or accost me, be  
certain you know first with certainty to whom you speak. Treat me as you  
will, but harm my sister, whether you think it to be I or no, and your  
valley will fall, and I will hunt every Joketsuzoku down, to the last  
child. I leave you now, to discuss your doom. Convince yourselves of its  
sooth, lest you bring destruction upon yourselves." With that, he   
disappeared, reappearing in Kho Lon's home, startling Xian Pu. He had  
considered transforming, taking on either tiger or dragon form... but he  
didn't want to reveal too much, and they had seemed sufficiently cowed.  
  
"Aiyah... How did you do that? How did the council go? They didn't hurt  
you?" Xian Pu was startled at first, but regained her composure quickly.  
It would not do to show weakness before such a catch.   
  
"Hurt me? No, not at all. They had very little to say, in fact." At  
this, Xian Pu was silent. Kho Lon's descriptions of council meetings was  
not one of silence. She could not imagine the irascible personalities  
that made up the council ever sitting in silence while listening to a  
mere male. "I am sorry, Xian Pu, I must go. My sister is eager to  
return." Xian Pu felt a pang at his leaving, but her heart leapt at the  
thought that he was sorry to leave her. Surely it was more than mere  
politeness that prompted his statement. She watched in interest as he  
magicked his sister in. She looked around, and spied Xian Pu.   
  
"Hmm. Where'd Kho Lon go, Xian Pu?" she asked curiously.   
  
"Kho Lon is at the council meeting, Ranko," Xian Pu answered her,  
though her mind was still on the delightful sight of Ranma in his  
moulded armor. She realized with a start that Ranko was also wearing  
armor, armor that showed off her curves, and her musculature, very  
nicely indeed. "Why are you wearing armor like Ranma was, Ranko?" she  
queried.  
  
"What? Oh, dear. Drat him, he could have changed back first." Suddenly  
Ranko was back in her basic black shirt and loose pants. Xian Pu felt a  
sudden sense of foreboding about this. It seemed very strange that Ranko  
had not realized she was wearing armor... but it was clearly not the  
same armor that Ranma had been wearing. She put it out of her mind.   
  
"Ranko, would you like to spar with me?" she asked. She was fairly  
certain that Ranko was a martial artist. Her body was so strong and  
lean, her movements so graceful.  
  
"You want to? Really? Sure!" Ranko seemed utterly delighted, and happily  
followed Xian Pu out to the practice field. As they sparred, Xian Pu was  
very surprised at Ranko's apparent lack of skill... she regularly made  
mistakes in the execution of moves. Yet she was astounded by Ranko's  
rate of improvement. She never made the same mistake twice, and Xian Pu  
felt by the end of the sparring, that Ranko had made at least a  
twenty-fold improvement in her skills. It was absolutely unbelievable.   
  
When they returned to Xian Pu's house, Genma intercepted them, and  
requested to speak to Ranko alone. Xian Pu conceded, and went inside to  
take her bath.   
  
"Ranko, look, I know you've never had any friends before, and you've got  
to be enjoying this... but don't you think we ought to be heading back  
to Japan? I mean, how long are you planning on staying here?" Genma  
hoped he was right... he thought Ranko might be susceptible to a little  
guilt. He was sure Ranma wouldn't be, but if he could convince Ranko, he  
could use her as leverage to control Ranma. Sure, she'd be disappointed  
when she learned that they couldn't see Nodoka, but she wouldn't want to  
be die, nor see Ranma hurt, so she'd go along with it. He wasn't sure  
how she'd feel about the engagement, but he'd cross that bridge when he  
came to it.  
  
Ranko looked at him a bit sadly, and almost looked a bit disappointed.  
"Look, Papa-san, we're really staying here for you." Genma looked quite  
startled at that. "What I mean is, well, while we're here, we're going  
to be practicing our ki control of our Jusenkyou curse. So that we won't  
change when splashed with water, except when we want to. In the  
meantime, he's working on a body for me. It'll be just like this one,  
only I won't really be in it, I'll still be in this head. But it'll be  
just like it was real, and I was in it. By the time winter is over here,  
we'll be ready to go to Japan, as Ranko and Ranma Saotome, together."  
Genma looked rather confused. "Look, Papa-san, I know you don't really  
understand that well. Just look at it this way. We will go to Mama-san,  
and we will BOTH be there. You will have to explain where you got me  
from, but Ranma will be unquestionably a man among men. We'll get to  
meet Mama, and you get off the hook, ok?"  
  
Genma looked rapturous, and a little fearful... a strange combination.  
"That's wonderful," he cried, and then "you'd do that for me? Why? I  
thought Ranma hated me."   
  
"Ranma doesn't hate you. He doesn't think much of you though. I'm the  
one who asked him for this. I never had a father, and you agreed to take  
me as yours. So I'm gonna get you Mama-san back, so I can have a real  
family." She grabbed him, and held on to him tightly. He hugged her  
back, tears seeping slowly down his face. The tears became real when he thought of Nodoka. Now that he no  
longer had to worry about her coddling the boy, and the seppuku pledge  
would be out of the way... though now that he thought about it, it would  
be unmanly to try to get out of an honorable engagement, that would be a  
good tool to use on Ranma... he could go back to Nodoka, and live off  
his son. Ahh... life would be good. 


	4. Sweet Sorrow

Sweet Sorrow  
  
  
After bathing, Ranko dressed again, and slipped out the back door of the  
house. As she snuck away, she extended her senses to be sure no-one was  
following. She leapt lightly, easily, over the village wall, then moved  
quickly through the forest until she found a clearing that had a large  
enough stone in it.  
  
She pulled back, allowing Ranma to come to the fore. Onna-Ranma used her  
ki claws to inscribe a rune of power and holding on the stone, and  
several runes of strength, then begin charging it. She charged it  
slowly, but at a steady pace. She was timing herself by what she had  
learned charging the stones in the room where she had... had failed. If  
she went slow enough, her ki replenished itself, and by the end, she was  
still at full, as was the stone.  
  
A little over an hour later, it was done. Ranma eased back, allowing  
Ranko to the fore again. At his urging, she focused, and drew up the ki  
aura, flickering blue flames that licked about her, then called on the  
Neko-ken. As the aura became more solid about her, Ranma watched in the  
glassy pool, muttering suggestions. He had noticed, from his external  
perspective, what she had not... that the aura was definitely, even  
distinctively feminine.   
  
Yet Ranma could see it wasn't working... she couldn't get the aura to  
disengage itself. He quickly cast a gate spell, opening a portal to the  
location he was scrying, and stepped through. She gasped. "You... you  
look like a ghost, Ranma."  
  
"I know." His voice was hollow and thin, strange-sounding even to his  
own ears. He reached out with threads of magic, and his will, and pulled  
on his ki. It resisted, and he strengthened the pull. Ranko cried out in  
pain, as her ki aura tore itself from her, and absorbed Ranma, becoming  
a male aura again. She fell to her knees.   
  
"Ranko," he cried out, "Release the stone. You must release the stone!"  
Already, he could feel the drawing sensation, as her body reached out to  
regain what was hers. The stone flared, and she cried out in relief. She  
stood, strong again, and looked at him, glowing blue male half-tiger  
standing before her.   
  
"I cannot come too close, Ranko. I can still feel the pull the body has  
for its ki. I've got to go away now. Don't worry... I've bound it with  
magic. I won't lose it." He turned, and leapt, bounding over the trees,  
and away from the clearing.   
  
She stared after him. She had noticed what he had not. Their aura had  
grown... the half-tiger that left her was fully ten feet tall. She  
wondered how big he would be as a half-dragon.  
  
Meanwhile Kho Lon paused in her slow thoughtful progress towards her  
house, and looked to the distant clearing. She had felt that sudden  
massive surge of magic and ki, and she started to move in that  
direction.  
  
Ranma was moving quickly now, with utter silence. He had a semi-solid  
form, he could feel the claws on his feet biting the ground. He passed  
within meters of two crouching Amazons, intent on their prey. They  
didn't notice him... nor did he notice the two older Amazons nearly a  
thousand feet up the slope, watching the younger two. After he was gone,  
they came bounding down to land behind the younger two.  
  
One of the younger two turned and hissed. "What are you doing?! You  
scared it off!" She was referring to the tiger she and her sister Amazon  
had been stalking.  
  
"More important things, child. A massive tiger spirit passed not two  
meters from you."  
  
"Over here," said the other woman, "Come here girls, look at these  
tracks. What made them?"  
  
"A tiger... a big tiger," the elder of the two girls said.  
  
"Look closer," the woman commanded them. "Look at the stride."  
  
"A two-legged tiger? What is this?" The younger girl looked at the two  
older women in confusion. "Tigers don't walk on two legs."  
  
"We watched the spirit. It was a tiger... and a man, and it walked on  
two legs, and moved in great bounding strides, but it glowed blue, and  
we could see you through it as it passed between us and you."  
  
"What should we do?" asked the older girl, "Send for an Elder, and  
follow it?"  
  
"Whatever mischief it plans will already be done by then," the first  
woman replied. "We will follow it, now!"  
  
They set off, tracking the tiger spirit. They strung out in a long line.  
One would stand where the tiger landed, near the visible indentations of  
its claws, while the other three moved ahead to scout for the next  
tracks. When they were found, the whole process would repeat. After  
tracking it for four hours, they realized it was slowing, and moved  
slower themselves. They switched to having two teams, so that two women  
together waited at the known tracks, while the other two looked for the  
new tracks. One member of each pair stayed focused on their   
surroundings, hoping to prevent the tiger from catching them unawares a  
second time.   
  
The second woman finally decided she knew where it was heading, and  
brought them around to where they would be able to look down upon the  
spot from a hill covered in trees and brush.   
  
Though the cover was good, Ranma would have known they were there. But  
he did not. He was not scanning the night with his sixth and seventh  
sense. Instead, he had turned them inward. He had released the Neko-ken,  
and been pleased that his aura seemed to lapse into his own shape, as he  
dwelt in it, rather than returning to blue flames.  
  
He had drawn up the magic into himself, and then stared down bemused at  
his body. It looked like him, on the outside. He was nude, he noticed,  
not having brought any clothing with him. He had been used to having  
Fey's clothing to fall back on, but the wristband was not on his wrist,  
it was on Ranko's. He decided to see if he could get out of the body  
without dissolving it, so he could look into it, and see why he couldn't  
seem to breathe, and felt no heartbeat.   
  
The watching girls breathed long happy sighs in awe, when they peeked  
over the top of the hill, and saw the naked young man, strong and  
beautifully muscled, standing by the deep pool that lay deep and still  
beyond the foam that churned at the base of the fifty foot waterfall. It  
was a perfect scene to frame what looked like a young god, and the girls  
would likely have gotten into a fight over which one got to go down and  
get defeated by him for peeping on him, had the older women not been  
there to hold them back.  
  
The older women held the girls back for the crucial moments it took for  
the tiger-spirit to step from the body, letting it drop lifeless to the  
ground. Ranma looked at himself, and realized that in even that short  
time, he had grown stronger, because the body had generated ki. "I  
should stay in a body, then." he said to himself, and drew up the magic  
strands.  
  
The watching Amazons stifled their gasps when the tiger-spirit seemed to  
suddenly take on real physical form. No longer a glowing blue, it looked  
like a true tiger now, yellow and black, and they had to stifle their  
sudden strong swell of desire for the finely muscled form.   
  
Ranma was delighted when he realized he could breathe. Apparently his  
tiger and dragon forms, based on his body as they were, had all the  
pieces, while the body he was trying to build was being created based on  
his spirit, an altogether different situation. He was also surprised  
that this body felt hungry... and it grew hungrier as it gazed on the  
body lying before it.   
  
At first he was slightly sickened at the thought, but then he realized  
that he would have to cut it up anyway, to study it and see what he had   
done wrong. He would either have to go and hunt and kill something else,  
that had done nothing, so that his hunger would not overwhelm him... Or  
eat his own body as he examined it. The decision was an easy one. After  
all, this body was his, there was no-one else to care if he ate it. He  
supposed he could have summoned some fruit, but this body was that of a  
carnivore, and the thought simply didn't have the appeal it would  
normally have held for him.  
  
The girls' desire was cramped when the beast reached out and tore off  
the boy's arm. The youngest girl could barely contain her retching. The  
second woman nudged the first. "Look at it. It is peeling back the skin,  
and looking at the muscle, before eating it. Why is it doing that?"  
  
They watched in mingled disgust and awe, as the beast proceeded to eat  
its way through the chest cavity. When the beast dove into the  
waterfall, to wash away the blood that matted its fur, they saw their  
chance, and darted down, picked up the still hot remains, almost whole  
except the arm that had been torn off, and made off with it.   
  
When Ranma emerged from the water, cleansed of blood, he shook himself  
vigorously, then gaped at the pool of blood, and the complete absence of  
his body. At first, he thought a wild animal had come to investigate the  
scent, but looking closer, he could see the footprints. The Amazons! Oh,  
no... he couldn't let them get that body back to the village. He was  
afraid of what Ranko would do when she recognized the face, which he had  
not harmed. He hadn't tried the mental communication, and didn't know if  
it would work. She would be asleep by now, so he couldn't try without  
alarming her. He set to work, hunting them, following the scent of his  
own blood.  
  
Several hours later, they stopped and made camp. The youngest girl ran  
her fingers across the bloody face. "He was so handsome, so strong... He  
would have been a good husband. I wonder who he was?"  
  
"Not Musk, I hope... though who else has such strong males, these days?"  
  
"Oh dear. We'll really be in for it if the Musk catch us carrying one of  
their own like this."  
  
"I doubt it. Its fairly obvious that the body was mauled by a beast."  
  
Suddenly, their senses alerted them to approaching danger, and they  
grabbed for their weapons. Before they could bring them to bear, the  
huge tiger-spirit had leaped over the trees to land in the clearing,  
heaved the torn body to its back, and leapt away again.  
  
They cursed fluently. "Now, what? We go back, and track it again?"  
  
"We'll leave a message here for the elders. They will come look, before  
tomorrow is finished. Hopefully, they will find this place, read the  
signs, and find our message." Even as she spoke, she was writing quickly  
on a leaf of parchment. She rolled it into a tube, tied it off, and hung  
it from a high branch. "Let's go."  
  
Ranma returned to his waterfall. He had surmised that they had come up  
while he was in the waterfall, and hadn't seen the massive tiger. He  
figured once they saw what took the body, they would leave well enough  
alone. That was why he had moved slowly enough to let them get a good  
look at him.   
  
He needed to burn this body anyway. He placed it on a rock, out in the  
depths of the pool. Hopefully that would at least keep off any wild  
animals drawn by the scent of blood. Before he left, he slashed the face  
to ribbons, to prevent identification, in case someone tried the same  
thing again.  
  
By the time he had built up a large enough pile of deadwood to lay the  
body upon, the women had returned, and taken up their position to watch.  
They observed him place the body on the pyre, deciding it must be some  
ritual the cat-spirit needed to retain his form.  
  
They watched, and their thoughts seemed confirmed, when he stood back  
from the pyre, still unlit, and raised a hand. Sudden blue flames  
flicked about it for a moment, as he lifted it to the air, and flames  
roared up from beneath the pyre! He watched the orange flames for a long  
minute, then decided they weren't hot enough to do the job. He drew up  
magic, hands glowing with power, and the flames roared higher and  
hotter, moving from orange to yellow, then finally they flared blue.  
  
The blue flame roared leaping high into the air, giving off no visible  
smoke, and when it finally died, Ranma leapt off into the night, wanting  
to focus on his body as it moved, and leapt, and breathed, so that he  
could feel the action of the organs.  
  
The Amazons crept down the hill, and surrounded the fire. One knelt and  
felt the ashes. They were a fine gray dust. No flesh, not even bone  
remained... and bone always remained. "Very hot fire?," one asked.  
  
"Spirit fire. The spirits took the body," responded another. They pulled  
back, and set up camp some distance away. They did not build a fire,  
this time.   
  
---  
  
When morning came, they again crept up to the hill. It took them a  
moment to realize that the tiger was there, lying sprawled upon the  
ground, snoring. They considered moving in and attacking it while it  
slept, only to have that option removed as it suddenly stirred. It sat  
up, shaking its large head back and forth as if to knock the sleep out.  
  
Ranma looked about blearily. Too early, and his mouth... he tasted iron.  
He looked at the pool, and thought about washing his mouth out with  
that, then he realized, as his senses were again stretched about him,  
more by reflex than intent, that he was being watched by four women.  
  
As he felt their auras, he realized they were not from his village, or  
at least, hadn't been there during the time that he had been. He  
wondered what to do about it... and realized he was entirely unclothed.  
He flicked his fingers and summoned a pair of black silk boxers, then a  
pair of loose, baggy pants. He didn't summon his usual tight shirt  
though. It would make his fur itch.   
  
He tried to decide what to do about the women... but his head hurt, and  
he didn't want to think about it. He would feel better after a cup of  
herbal tea, he decided. He glanced in their direction, but saw no  
movement. He thought about looking for herbs, but decided not to bother.  
So what if they saw he could do magic? It would just make them more  
afraid, he thought, and maybe they would go and leave him alone. He  
summoned a low table, and a tea set, with five place settings. He wasn't  
sure why he did that, but then decided he wouldn't really mind company.   
  
He summoned five tatami mats, and knelt on one, pouring the herbal tea  
into his cup. He lifted it, and took a large sip, rolling it around in  
his mouth, to get the taste of iron out, then spat it behind him. He  
took another sip, and swallowed this time. He looked directly at the  
women, with a challenging gaze, and smiled at them. He wasn't really  
aware that smiling with a mouth full of terribly sharp teeth is not the  
most reassuring thing you can do.  
  
"Aiiee... he knows we are here!," the youngest squealed. The second  
woman slapped the girl's head. "If he was unsure before, he knows now,  
foolish girl. Well we know he can move faster than we. We cannot run and  
hope to escape, if he chooses to follow. Let us go down and meet him. It  
seems we have little choice to do otherwise." She stood, holding her  
spear, and stepped out of the underbrush, and walked down to the grassy  
waterside, followed by the other three, all holding their weapons  
nervously.  
  
He had placed the four additional settings and mats across the table  
from himself, reckoning they would not want to get too close. He was  
only partially right. The closer they got, the stronger their desire for  
him became. As they approached, he smiled again, and holding the tea pot  
delicately in his massive hand, he poured tea into the four cups. They  
sat gingerly on the mats, watching him. It was only then that he really  
realized that he had gotten larger. Even sitting down, he towered over  
them.  
  
The two younger ones still looked fearful, but the elder had firmed  
their faces. They would not show weakness before a spirit, lest he take  
it as an invitation to attack. They gripped their cups firmly, and  
drank, praying inside that it not be poisoned. He had drunk first after  
all, from the same teapot, but wait... he had... yes. Both coming to the  
same conclusion, they followed his pattern of swishing the tea in their  
mouths, then turning to spit it behind them, before drinking from their  
cups. The younger two followed suit, as he looked on.  
  
When he saw that they weren't going to take the lead and speak, he  
decided he needed to impress on them that he was not prey, to be hunted.  
He raised his large claw, and the first woman's spear jerked forward,  
almost pulled from her grasp, as the haft just below the head slapped  
into his palm. She gasped, eyes wide in fear, as he casually snapped the  
head off the weapon. He took the metal head in one hand, holding it  
above the other, and supplied great heat with his ki, as he had done  
when learning weaponsmithing.  
  
They gasped in awe, and the acrid scent of fear rose from them, as the  
droplets of brightly glowing molten metal dripped through his fingers to  
roll and pool on his palm. "I am not for hunting." Ranma said plainly.  
His voice was different in this form. It was deeper, rougher, almost a  
growl. The women nodded slowly. Finally, the woman who's spear he had  
destroyed spoke. "We were not hunting you, Lord Spirit. We are Amazons,  
and we must investigate possible dangers to our tribe."   
  
"I am no danger to your tribe. I am here, not to disturb you, but to  
work in peace. I must make a body for my sister... but I must perfect my  
own first. I have no female example to work from, but I will manage."  
His words were simple, direct. He was stating in the plainest terms why  
he was here, hoping they could see his sincerity, and would leave him in  
peace.  
  
He did not really consider the effect his words would have from their  
perspective. He didn't know that they had seen everything they had.   
  
He didn't know that they had watched as he pulled the body apart,  
examining each piece before eating it. He didn't realize the  
implications they would draw from his statement of the lack of a female  
example. Each of them was picturing this beast slowly stripping their  
flesh, examining each piece, as he devoured it.   
  
Furthermore, he had just told them enough to realize that he was not yet  
confident of his understanding of the male body... much less the  
female... He would surely need many examples, and they had just told him  
they were from a tribe of Amazons. His smile, meant to put them at ease,  
seemed to them the grin of a beast looking forward to having some fun.  
  
Their hands were cold with sweat, and even to themselves they stank of  
fear, as they sat drinking their tea, and wondering how they would get  
out of this. Ranma smelled their fear, but didn't realize the real  
reason for it. He figured he had done enough to ensure they would not  
return, not realizing that he had in fact done exactly what would ensure  
their return in force. When he saw that they had finished their tea, he  
waved a hand, and the tea set disappeared, as did the table and mats. He  
stood, and they got shakily to their feet, looking up at him with  
fearful eyes. Even the older women could not disguise their terror, and  
they were frightened still more by the fact that they could still feel a  
strong udnercurrent of desire for him, through their fear, leading them  
to believe the desire was unnatural, perhaps even magical in nature.  
  
"Remember," he said, in a deep rumble, "I'm not for hunting." He turned,  
and with several leaping bounds, was quickly out of sight. The Amazons  
sagged against each other in sudden relief, as the fear and desire both  
drained away.  
  
"He doesn't need us?" The youngest asked hopefully.  
  
"Not yet," replied the first woman, "Not yet. You heard him, he must  
master the male form, before he begins on the female. We must destroy  
him before that time. We must get to the village, quickly, to warn the  
elders." With that, they were off.  
  
The next day, when Ranma awoke, there were two elders and ten strong  
warriors concealed on a hill across the stream, protected from his sight  
by a powerful magical medallion worn by one of the elders. They watched  
with wide eyes, as he stood up, stepping up and out of his body,   
becoming once again the glowing entity of ki, before suddenly filling  
out again. The tiger-spirit picked his old body up, and carried it to  
lay by the water. He tore open its chest, and washed the blood away with  
water.   
  
The elders had looked at each other with awe in their eyes when he had  
stepped from his body. A spirit of pure ki... unbelievable! Silently,  
they praised their luck at its decision to examine its own body. Had  
they not seen it arise so easily from its prison of flesh, they would  
have attacked. They realized now that slaying its body would have little  
effect on it, and settled in to watch, hoping to see a weakness.  
  
They looked on, as the creature removed one organ after another, tracing  
the connections between them, and slicing them open to examine the  
inside, before laying them back in the body. After examining his own  
chest cavity for nearly an hour, the spirit shucked his new body, then  
suddenly became a strong young man, shucked that body as well, then  
picked up the tiger body he had just discarded, and put it back on.  
  
He lay the boy's body down, and broke open its chest in the same way. He  
had done better... there was a heart, and lungs, and he had been able to  
take a breath. Still, the stomach wasn't connected to the mouth, and the  
lines that went from the heart to the lungs were missing. He sighed.  
This would be a long slow process... and then he would have to do the  
same with women. Sighing, he gestured at the bodies, and they erupted in  
crackling blue flames that quickly reduced them to ash.   
  
He sat lotus style, and went to reach for his flute, but it was not  
there. He realized, once again, that Ranko had the Dragon Fang. Aah...  
he could use that wakizashi he had made. He pictured where it sat,  
cradled on wooden pegs on a board in his room at the castle, and he  
called to it, and pulled it to him.   
  
The watching elders gasped in awe when he pulled a beautiful dark blue  
wakizahi from nowhere. They were even more startled when it became a  
dark blue flute, and the tiger began to play. The warriors around them  
sighed happily, thrilled by the beautiful music. The elders were  
concerned... they could feel the ki that imbued the music with power,  
and wondered what the beast was trying to accomplish. They could see  
that the tiger's eyes were closed in concentration.  
  
They all gawked in startled wonder when a gorgeous green haired neriad  
rose silently from the water, only hair covering her heaving upper  
body, to lie listening upon a stone amidst the depths of the pool. The  
young warriors saw only a well-endowed young woman with greenish skin,  
brilliant sea-green hair, and a long snake's body below the waist. The  
elders though, saw a being of power, a neriad, a spirit of water, drawn  
up, entranced by the tiger-spirit's music.  
  
When he lifted his head from his flute, to draw a deep breath, and sigh,  
and look about him, the neriad slipped quietly from the rock back into  
the silent depths of the pool. She was gone before his gaze fell upon  
the rock, and the elders realized to their shock that the tiger-spirit  
had not only not intended to summon the water-spirit, but been unaware  
of doing so. The power implied in being able to accidentally summon a  
being of such power stunned them.  
  
The music had eased his emotions, and his heart was steady again. But  
his mind still roiled with tangled thoughts. He needed to clear his head  
now. He leapt gracefully out to that stone in the depths of the pool,  
and began a slow kata. He did not see the neriad rise amongst the  
concealing waters of the waterfall, but the elders did. They too   
watched, entranced at his powerful forms and flowing punches and kicks.   
  
They were stunned when he reached the aerial portion of the kata,  
moving considerably faster now, and several times landed upon the water  
and leapt lightly again, leaving only the faintest of ripples behind.   
  
The first time his fist moved faster than sound, cracking the very air,  
they all jumped in shock, but the neriad clapped her hands in delight.  
  
The tiger-spirit paused suddenly, landing lightly on the stone, and  
looking around for the source of the sound. The neriad moved from the  
concealment of the flowing water, holding her upper body easily above  
the water, and moved toward him. She opened her mouth, when his gaze lit  
upon her, and sang at him, a warbling beautiful sound like water  
babbling across stones in a shallow stream.  
  
He stared in awe at the vision of beauty moving towards him. Not again,  
not again, he was thinking desperately, afraid that he recognized the  
hungry, possessive look in her eyes, but he seemed powerless to flee,  
mesmerized by the beautiful sound of her voice. Tigers, unlike most  
other cats, are not afraid of water, but will indeed go swimming in it  
for pleasure. He slid off the rock, and used the Juushin Jisei to hold  
himself partially submerged, so his head was level with hers. His eyes  
flicked down, and he saw her long body snaking away beneath them.  
  
"Lady," he said, in his deep rumbling voice, "I'm sorry, but I cannot  
understand you." She had reached him them, and immediately raised a hand  
to run lightly along his chest, feeling his powerful muscles. "I did not  
mean to disturb you. I did not know this was your pool. I will leave, if  
you wish." He made the offer in hope that she would ask it, though the  
feel of her hand on his chest made him think she did not want him to  
leave. He was rather worried, in fact, about what she probably did want.  
  
The watching Amazons were equally mesmerized by the sight. Only the two  
elders knew fear. They too could not pull themselves away, but they had  
heard stories of what angry water spirits could do, and they imagined  
that both spirits would grow angry if they detected their presence upon  
the hill.  
  
Ranma moved slowly to draw up threads of magic. He could see she was a  
being of magic, and he wanted to move slowly enough that she could have  
time to see what he was doing, and that there was no need to fear it.  
When he completed the spell, he spoke again, and though his voice came  
out sounding like the rushing of water down a thin gorge, he understood  
it, and her response. "I say again, Lady, it was not my intention to  
disturb you. I am sorry. I did not know this was your pool, and I will  
leave, if you wish it."  
  
"Please, do not leave. Your music speaks to my heart, fierce tiger, and  
I enjoyed watching you play above my pool. You are pleasant to look  
upon." He felt her coils sliding about his body, submerged beneath the  
rippling surface of the pool, a cold caress. "If I let you stay, will  
you play for me again?"  
  
"Lady, I cannot stay forever, but if you let me stay, I will play for  
you." She smiled at that, and he saw that she had long fangs, like a  
poisonous snake, but it only made her smile more beautiful.  
  
"I can see that another holds your heart, fierce tiger, so I will not  
ask more of you than that, and that you let me watch you at play."  
  
"At play, Lady? I do not understand you."  
  
"When you danced upon the water, just now. You are beautiful, you know."  
  
"Oh... my katas. Yes, Lady, I do not mind if you watch my katas."  
  
"What are you doing here, fierce tiger? Why do you sit and play by my  
waters? I thought you called to me, but that is not why you are here, is  
it?"  
  
"No, Lady." He smiled. "I am making a body for my sister, that together  
we may free my Lady from bondage, and find my mother."  
  
"A noble cause, indeed. I could wish your heart were not already taken,  
fierce tiger." She smiled at him, then backed away, and sank beneath the  
water.   
  
The watching elders had not understood the words, but they could see  
that some agreement had been reached. They watched in surprise and   
wonder, when the tiger-spirit rose smoothly from the water, then padded  
across the surface as if it were solid ground, to stand upon the near  
shore, and shake the water from his fur.  
  
He looked about him, then bounded off, disappearing into the distance  
almost instantly. The elders took the warriors back to the village. They  
would have to convene the council, to debate what to do. They were not  
sure that even the whole village had the power to fight this thing. 


	5. Ranko

Ranko  
  
  
Five days after Ranma left, a meeting was convened of the council.   
Ranko had been training with Xian Pu every day, and had quickly reached  
her skill level. Xian Pu could no longer defeat Ranko. Ranko had all the  
knowledge Ranma had, and had only needed some time in a real body to get  
used to how to apply it. Now Xian Pu had begun training in ki  
techniques, and was eager for Ranko to learn with her. But though she  
was an honorary member, it was a temporary thing only. Her quick  
ascension in skill had made it painfully clear that whatever they taught  
her, they taught to Ranma. While Ranko was eager to learn, and quite  
willing to promise never to teach the technique to an outsider, it was  
unknown how Ranma would respond.   
  
The council debated for two hours, considering whether to even give him  
the opportunity. Some few felt that teach him would be foolhardy,  
tantamount to teaching the Musk, their sworn enemy. These were mostly  
the ones who refused to be impressed by his demonstration, and to  
believe that the Joketsuzoko had the power to resist him. Others felt  
that he could be trusted to learn, since he could destroy them anyway,  
but how could they trust that he would not teach them? If he did, there  
was nothing they could do about it. So better not to give him the  
chance. Others were all for it, as a way of giving him more reason to  
consider an alliance with him. A few more were of the opinion that they  
should ask him not to teach others, but leave it to his discretion, and  
teach him regardless, so that any time an enemy faced that that knew   
the techniques, they could call on him, saying "Here is one that  
threatens us because of you, so you should defend us."  
  
In the end, they agreed to ask him. They asked Ranko to bring him, and   
were troubled when she said that she could not, that he was not with  
her. She told them she would summon him, if they convened the council.   
  
They convened, and were even more disturbed when he appeared before  
them, without a body, merely a glowing figure of pure ki. He listened to  
them, then replied that he would refrain from teaching any technique  
that he did not already know, and did not learn from another source. It  
bothered them, but in the end they agreed.  
  
They found out why he had given his curious prescription, when Ranko  
failed to learn the Kachuu Tenshin Amaguriken. She had watched with  
interest as Kho Lon demonstrated, tossing the chestnuts into the open  
flames of the small fire she built, then shouted "KACHUU TENSHIN  
AMAGURIKEN" as her arms blurred, and she held out her hands with all the  
chestnuts. When Kho Lon tossed them in again, Ranko waited till they  
opened, and silently grabbed them all from the fire, showing them to Kho  
Lon, without saying a word, and using only one hand. Kho Lon had stared  
at her in shock for a long minute, because she had been watching for the  
signs of ki, and Ranko had not used any, nor needed any.   
  
It was nothing special for her, just moving very fast. She could do it,  
they found, with any part of her body, even her whole body. She could  
move fast enough to tap every knuckle of each fist on each punch thrown  
by Kho Lon in the Chestnut Fist. In other words, she could easily,  
without strain, move five times faster than Kho Lon's Chestnut Fist.  
After a public demonstration of that, the last grumbles on the council  
died out. If Ranko could so easily defeat a Matriarch, no one any longer  
dared doubt that Ranma could destroy them.  
  
---  
  
A week after Ranko started sparring with Xian Pu, they were walking near  
the entrance to the village, when they heard the sounds of laughter and  
discussion. "They've returned." Xian Pu sighed in disgust.  
  
"Who, Xian Pu?" queried Ranko.  
  
"Mu Suu and his family," replied Xian Pu, and they both heard an  
exuberant male voice call out.  
  
"Xian Pu! I'm back!" Mu Suu raced down the path, and saw his love before  
him, and heard her voice. He leapt to glomp her... and to his utter  
surprise, he actually landed. Usually, she batted him away well before  
he could reach her. She must really love him! She must have... wait, no,  
why was she so stiff, and why was she crying? A fist slammed into his  
head, and he was knocked away, and Elder Kho Lon had grabbed him firmly  
by the hair, and was dragging him away. "Xian Pu!" he cried out again.  
"I love you!"  
  
Xian Pu held the crying Ranko, and guided her back through the village,  
shooting sharp glares at anyone who so much as looked twice. She helped  
the girl inside, and sat her down on the couch. "What's wrong, Ranko? It  
was just that stupid Mu Suu. He mistook you for me. Stupid blind fool."  
Xian Pu held Ranko and tried to comfort her.  
  
"R-Ranma...," she gasped out, between sobs, "Ranma i-is going to be s-so  
angry with me... H-he gave me this beautiful body and I c-c-couldn't  
even defend it. I d-didn't even h-have a c-c-chance to react to the  
attack. I could have been k-killed."  
  
"Ssshh.. It's not like that, Ranko. He wasn't attacking you," Xian Pu  
said, as she hugged the smaller girl to her, and rocked her back and  
forth. "He was just... he thought you were me... and he was trying to  
show me how much he loves me... the fool."  
  
"It... it wasn't an attack?" Ranko asked tearfully, yet with a sudden  
light of hope in her eyes.  
  
"No, Ranko-chan. It wasn't an attack. He wouldn't have hurt you," Xian  
Pu replied. I wouldn't have let him. Stupid blind idiot. She comforted  
Ranko, holding her until her tears stopped, then wiping them away. "Its  
alright... shhh... that's right... don't worry... Kho Lon has him...  
he'll never touch you like that again..." Ranko finally fell asleep in  
her arms. Xian Pu lifted her gently, and took her upstairs. She put her  
in bed, pulling the blankets up around her, and then just watched for a  
minute, smiling as the pain and fear faded, and her face was again  
innocent and happy in sleep.  
  
Meanwhile, Kho Lon had dragged Mu Suu into an empty practice hall, and  
flung him to the floor.   
  
"You fool! You complete imbecile! What were you thinking? What could you  
have been thinking?" Mu Suu tried to respond, only to get rapped on the  
head by her staff.   
  
"Silence, male! You listen to me, and you listen well!" Her voice grew  
hard and cold, and it was tinged by a fear Mu Suu had never heard in her  
voice before.   
  
"You may just doomed all the Joketsuzoku, you fool. We have put up with  
your foolish pursuit of Xian Pu for too long! She does not want you, and  
you know that. Yet still you chase after her." Kho Lon was pacing back  
and forth in front of him now. He pulled himself up to a sitting  
position, and folded his legs beneath him, keeping his head downcast to  
avoid her anger. He had never heard her so furious, but it was the tinge  
of fear that lurked in her words that struck him with a force nothing  
else had ever done.   
  
"Now, in your endless pursuit of Xian Pu, you may have condemned her to  
death! Can you understand that, boy? Is any of this getting through your  
thick head?" She rapped him again.  
  
"That little girl that you glomped is the beloved sister of the most  
powerful man I have ever seen. That little girl is faster than I, a  
Matriarch of the Joketsuzoku! She can move faster than my Amaguriken!  
And she is but a shadow of the might of her brother." Her voice was hard  
but low now. "The only reason she did not destroy you out of hand, boy,  
is the kindness of her heart. Her brother shares that kindness, boy.  
BUT! But, his kindness is overwhelmed by his love for his sister. If she  
comes to harm while she's here, he will destroy us all! Do you   
understand me, boy?!"  
  
He bowed deeply before her. "Yes, Honored Elder. Forgive me... I thought  
she was Xian Pu..."  
  
"Silence! Do you think that can excuse you? Who will be there to forgive  
you, when Xian Pu and the rest of the Jokesuzoku are DEAD because of  
you? You don't seem to comprehend the magnitude of what you have done.  
That little girl, is the sister of Lord Fey. He is a stronger martial  
artist than anyone here, the founder and grandmaster of his own school  
or martial arts, an archmage, and beloved of a dragon. He could destroy  
us out of hand, you stupid sniveling fool! If you love Xian Pu, you will  
stay far away from Ranko, and you will stay away from Xian Pu. I think  
that you have been reprieved, this time, boy. If she had gone crying to  
Ranma, we would already be dead. So you have a chance to redeem  
yourself. Do NOTHING to hurt her, boy. Attack NO ONE! Do you understand  
me? Ranma won't care that you didn't know it was her when you hurt her,  
Mu Suu. He will see her hurt, and he will destroy us. You will stay away  
from Ranko, and you will stay away from Xian Pu! Now, stay here until  
nightfall, boy, and think of how close you came to killing Xian Pu  
today, you who claim to love her." She spat this last in his face, and  
turned and stomped out.  
  
---  
  
Ranko awoke, wondering why she was in her bed. She didn't remember going  
to sleep... then she remembered Mu Suu's return. She slipped out of bed,  
and down the stairs, pausing to listen to Kho Lon and Xian Pu.   
  
"Yes, great-grandmother, Ranko was very upset. She didn't stop crying  
until she was exhausted. I put her to bed upstairs. She seemed to think  
that Ranma would be very angry..." Ranko heard Kho Lon's frightened  
gasp. "at her."  
  
"At her?," Kho Lon interrupted, "Why on earth would he be angry at her?"  
  
"I'm not sure, I think because Ranko thought it was an attack, and she  
didn't defend herself. I managed to convince her that it wasn't an  
attack. That damned sightless fool."  
  
"Yes, he nearly killed us all. But I had a long talk with him. He won't  
come near her again, and I told him in clear terms to stay away from you  
as well."  
  
"Oh, thank you, great-grandmother. The last thing I need is for Ranma to  
come, and see that fool hanging on me. Unless you think he would be  
jealous?" There was a hopeful tinge to the last question.  
  
"No. Until he frees the Lady Alana, I don't think he will even notice.  
The boy has an iron will, a control like I've never seen before."  
  
Their voices faded, and Ranko heard the front door open, and close   
behind them. She slipped down, and out the back door, and went in search  
of Mu Suu. It sounded like they had been terribly angry with him. But he  
hadn't attacked her. He had thought she was Xian Pu, and was being  
happy. Now he must feel terribly alone and sad... She reached out with  
her aura, and felt among the auras around her, until she found one  
tinged with a deep depression. She followed it, finally finding it in an  
otherwise empty training hall.   
  
She slipped in, and heard Mu Suu's gasp of surprise. She walked quickly  
over to him, and knelt down before him. Mu Suu said nothing after that  
first gasp. His glasses were straight again, and though blurry, he could  
see the fiery red of her hair, and knew that somehow, he had already  
failed Kho Lon, and come near her. He wanted to hate her, wanted to hit  
her, destroy her, for coming between him and his lovely Xian Pu. But he  
held himself still, knowing that to touch her, to hit her, even to  
frighten her, might make Ranma hurt his Xian Pu. While he only wanted to  
hate Ranko, he did hate Ranma. Ranko was only a danger to him because of  
Ranma.   
  
It was Ranma who stood between him and his Xian Pu. Ranma who blocked  
him, hiding behind this small fiery girl. How dare he! How dare he hide  
behind a woman, and take his Xian Pu from him! Ranma must want Xian Pu  
for himself.   
  
He shuddered in rage, then barely muffled a gasp, as his attention was  
brought back to the present, by the tender, innocent touch of Ranko's  
delicate fingers, as she took off his glasses and set them aside. He  
shivered as she ran her fingers lightly over his eyes, and he felt the  
unbelievably powerful touch of her ki, tinged with sadness, but bursting  
with hope, as she peered into his eyes.  
  
"Poor Mu Suu," she said, and he cringed at the pitying words, before  
realizing suddenly that there was no pity in her tones, only sympathy.  
"Your eyes have been growing worse, haven't they?" He nodded slowly.  
"Yes... there is... an illness in your eyes, Mu Suu. This is not  
natural, not normal blindness. I can help you, I think," she smiled at  
him, and he felt the darkness of the room fade, and it was like he was  
lying in a field, soaking in the sunshine.   
  
"Will you let me help you, Mu Suu?" she asked, softly. He nodded again,  
not daring to speak. Was it possible? The village healers and the  
western doctors had agreed, nothing could be done about his eyes. Could  
this little girl, so innocent, really be able to help him? Why would she  
want to, after what he had done to her?  
  
She did not notice his confusion, only his assent, and laid her fingers  
on his eyes again, closing them. He felt the touch of her ki again, and  
then suddenly a blinding, burning sensation in his eyes, and he  
scrambled backward and away from her, shivering in fear. Red light swam  
before his eyes... he dreaded opening them. Somehow he felt sure that  
she had tried and failed, and now he would be truly blind, unable to  
ever see his Xian Pu again.  
  
Then she was before him again, and he cringed back. But he was in a  
corner, and couldn't escape... he could, but he'd have to hurt her, and  
that would mean his Xian Pu's death, and so he held still before the  
little monster who had taken his sight, shivering in fear. Wasn't it  
enough? Wasn't it enough that she had stolen his sight? How far would  
her retribution go, what more could she take from him? He felt her light  
touch on his face again, and heard her soft voice.   
  
"Mu Suu, please... open your eyes." Slowly, ever so slowly he did as  
she asked... he saw her, with perfect clarity, her beautiful face, her  
sad, deep blue eyes, her glorious fiery hair, her beautiful figure and  
taut wiry strength visible beneath her tight black shirt... and he gaped  
in awe. He could see! He could see perfectly, and he wasn't wearing  
glasses! He pulled himself quickly to his knees, and dropped his head  
to the floor.  
  
"Thank you, oh goddess, thank you. Thank you." He was crying tears of  
joy, and they fell from his perfect eyes on to her bare feet. She   
giggled, then, and grabbing his shoulders, pulled him up.   
  
"Stand up, silly," and she stood, lifting him easily to his feet, as  
though he weighed nothing at all. She grabbed his hand, laughing  
delightedly, as she pulled him to the door. She crushed his glasses  
beneath her feet. "You won't need those anymore." He gasped... mustn't  
let her get hurt, and she stepped on his glasses, her foot would be  
cut... and gasped again, as she pulled him forward, and as her foot came  
up, and he could see the bottom, soft and uncalloused, and completely  
uninjured. A goddess. She was definitely a goddess. She had come to  
him, after he had hurt her, and she had helped him, for no reason he  
could see, given him perfect eyes, and been happy to do so, without  
asking anything of him.   
  
He could not hate her... he could not even be indifferent to her. He  
could only love her. He felt his rage and hatred to the unknown Ranma  
fade away as well. What kind of man would he be, if he did not do all he  
could to protect this goddess? Ranma made perfect sense to him now. He  
followed her out the door and down the steps, not even considering or  
realizing that he was breaking Kho Lon's command to him. His goddess  
wanted him to follow her, and he could do no less.  
  
Kho Lon was still discussing what to do with Xian Pu, when they fell  
silent, noticing Ranko and Mu Suu leaving the training hall. "Oh, no..."  
Kho Lon groaned. They ran towards them, desperate to... then they both  
slowed together, and stared with a puzzled gaze at each other. Mu Suu  
and Ranko both looked... happy?  
  
They watched bemused, as Ranko walked towards them, smile shining on her  
face. Kho Lon noted with some concern, that Mu Suu was not wearing his  
glasses. "Boy," she barked at him, "Where are your glasses?"  
  
He smiled in the face of her anger, "I don't need them anymore, Elder.  
Ranko healed my eyes." Kho Lon smiled then. Such a beauty the little  
darling was. After crying herself to sleep because Mu Suu had thrown  
himself on her, she had sought him out just to heal his eyes? Amazing.  
Then she noticed something even more disturbing... with proper vision,  
she expected him to be filling his vision with his Xian Pu... but he  
spared her hardly a glance.   
  
His eyes were fixed firmly on Ranko, and his face held a look of  
adoration. This definitely bore watching. If the fool started chasing  
Ranko the way he had chased Xian Pu, they might all be in trouble. But  
he didn't seem to be... he was just watching her. Ah well, it was all to  
the good if it got him to leave Xian Pu alone to chase Ranma. He really  
was a strong fighter... if his problems with his eyes, which had been  
steadily worsening since childhood, were finally gone, and he was over  
his silly infatuation with Xian Pu, then he would be a legitimately nice  
catch for one of the younger girls. If he caught Ranko, then Ranma might  
be more willing to consider Xian Pu... This could turn out very well  
indeed.  
  
---  
  
Ranko also surprised them by spending much of her time with the Healer,  
learning her art. It was clear to those who watched her spar that she  
did not learn this for herself. Any injury received, any cut or bruise,  
was healed by the time the next punch was thrown by her opponent, even  
before she started studying with the healer.   
  
A few days later, Xian Pu began to understand why. Ranko started   
sparring with much more of her capacity. Xian Pu was getting hit harder,  
and thrown farther, yet by the time she landed, or the next punch she  
was thrown, her injury was healed. Their sparring matches became real  
spectacles, going on for hours. Xian Pu knew it was Ranko, because when  
she sparred with others, her bruises stayed with her, and she could last  
no longer than normal.   
  
---  
  
Ukyou looked at the sign, then at the booklet in her hand again. "Yep,  
this is the place."   
  
"All these pools," Ryouga said, looking out over the hundreds of small  
pools, bamboo poles rising from them, "are supposed to be cursed?"  
  
"Yep. Look, I bet that's the guide's hut, over there. Let's see if he's  
seen them. I still can't understand why every place we go to, they only  
remember Genma. That postcard we intercepted clearly said Ranma was with  
him." Ukyou shook off her confusion, and strode to the guide's hut. She  
rapped on the door, then stepped back waiting.   
  
She heard a man's voice, some distance away, and turned to look. A  
rather ordinary looking fellow with glasses was coming towards them,  
picking a careful path amongst the pools. She waited in silence for his  
approach.   
  
He stood before them, bowing politely, and saying something in a  
language she didn't understand. She shook her head, and he said several  
more things, before finally saying in Japanese, "Honored Customers  
understand tongue of land of Wa, yes?"  
  
"Yes, we speak Japanese. We are seeking information."  
  
"Ah, Honored Customers, Jusenkyou Guide has much information. Pools very  
dangerous. You stay away, please?" He about swallowed his tongue when  
they nodded. This was almost as weird... no, even weirder than that  
young man. Not only did they listen, but they actually agreed to stay  
away from the pools? He led them into the hut.  
  
He listened politely, as Ukyou described Genma. Then he nodded  
vigorously. "Stupid man, not listen, turn into panda." Ryouga choked  
with laughter.   
  
"He looking for son." Ryouga shut up, suddenly listening with an almost  
frightening intensity. "I not find that out till later. He leave, go  
away. Young man appear, dressed in black silk. Ask for Nyannichuan. I  
try to warn him, he say he know, make me take him there. He go in pool,  
come out a girl, very pretty, red hair. She come to hut, act weird, draw  
circles on floor, fall over. I put in bed, old man come back, describe  
young man. I tell him about girl, he go nuts. Girl wake up, think she is  
cat, go chase him after he turn into panda. Finally girl come back,  
carrying old man, and go with Elder to Joketsuzoku village. Not know  
where now."  
  
Ukyou choked when the guide mentioned the Nyannichaun, and turned pale  
when he described the girl Ranma had become, but thanked him when he  
finished, and gave him several coins in return for a map to the village.  
  
---  
  
Some time later, they were approaching the village, when they heard a  
voice call out ahead of them, in an unfamiliar language. They followed  
the voice, and stepped into a clearing. Across from them, watching them  
warily, was a young girl, with brilliant red hair, dressed in a tight  
black silk shirt, and loose black silk pants.  
  
Ryouga, noticing that the girl was not wearing a bra, pinched his nose,  
trying to concentrate on the fact that this was Ranma, Ukyou's enemy,  
not a beautiful young girl.   
  
She said something again, in a demanding tone, her gaze worried and  
suspicious, though still in a language they did not know.  
  
"I am Kuonji Ukyou, and I've come to challenge you, Ranma. FOR WHAT YOU  
DID TO ME, DIE!!" Ukyou whipped out her spatula, and leapt to the  
attack. Ranko pulled a golden katana from nowhere.  
  
She too leapt forward, parrying Ukyou's attack. "You lie!" she shouted  
in Japanese, tears starting to run down her face. "What did you do to  
Ucchan?! You think I wouldn't remember my best friend was a boy?!?"  
Ukyou found herself suddenly on the defensive, as Ranko's sword pressed  
forward. The girl's face was set in a look of rage, but tears poured  
down her cheeks.   
  
Ryouga finally mastered himself, and seeing Ukyou pressed back, tiny   
cuts starting to appear in her clothes, forgot his promise, and leapt to  
her defense, raising his heavy metal umbrella like a sword.   
  
They were both pressed back, helpless against the fury of her assault.  
Ryouga was shocked at the degree to which he was overmastered. He was  
nowhere near Ranma's skill level, he realized with despair. He and Ukyou  
were going to die here. But the girl collapsed suddenly, leaning on her  
sword, sobbing deeply.   
  
"What did you do to him? What did you do to Ucchan?" She looked up at  
them, her face lined with pain. "What did he ever do to you?" She  
stumbled to her feet, stepping back away from them. Ukyou was still  
trying to recover her breath, and Ryouga was desperately trying to  
figure out what was going on. "And why do you want to kill Ranma? He  
never did anything to Ucchan. I'd know, I'd remember, if he had."  
  
Ukyou just stared at her. "R-Ranma?" It was obvious, he really had  
absolutely no idea that Ukyou was a girl. That meant that his stupid  
father had never told him about the engagement. Her heart soared for a  
brief moment. "You... you didn't reject me?"   
  
Before the girl could answer, the forest about them erupted, and they  
were instantly surrounded by women wielding weapons. Swords were held at  
both their throats before they could react. An ugly, wrinkled old crone  
bounded into the clearing on a staff. She looked pale, and afraid, and  
angry.   
  
She bounced directly to the red-haired girl. "Ranko, are you all right,  
my child?," she asked gently. Again the two travelers were unable to  
understand her words.  
  
"Yes, great-grandmother... but they did something terrible to Ucchan, I  
know it," she said, in Japanese, between sobs. She pointed her sword at  
Ukyou. "She said she was Ukyou, and then she attacked me."  
  
"Who was Ukyou, Ranko?," the crone said, responding in Japanese, to  
the traveler's relief, eyeing Ukyou, noting the missing Adam's apple,  
and the other subtle clues that said this was a girl.  
  
"He... He was Ranma's best friend, when he was five," Ranko  
responded, tearfully. Ukyou was seriously disturbed now. The old crone  
had called the girl Ranko, and the girl was talking as if Ranma was  
someone else. Had they made a terrible mistake? She fit the guide's  
description. "She... she called me Ranma..."  
  
The crone turned to face the two, who stood with swords against their  
throats. "Understand this. This child is under the protection of the  
Joketsuzoku. By attacking her, you have attacked us. The sentence for  
attacking us is death."  
  
"No, Great-Grandmother. Please... at least, at least not until we find  
out what they did to Ucchan. I..." She stared up at the girl. "Did you  
fall in the Nyannichuan?" Her voice was quiet, strained.  
  
"I was born a girl."  
  
"You..." Ranko stepped closer, touched her cheek. "You look like  
Ucchan...," she said, almost with regret. She looked deeply into Ukyou's  
brown eyes, and Ukyou found herself lost in Ranko's blue eyes, so like  
Ranma's as she remembered them. Ranko reached out gingerly, and felt  
Ukyou's aura. She felt no deceit. Fear, anger, love... "Ucchan...  
you're.. you're a girl?" Ranko reached up and pushed aside the sword at  
Ukyou's throat. "You were a girl? But... but why do you want to kill  
Ranma? You were his best friend."   
  
She looked terribly confused, Ukyou thought. "Our fathers decided to  
engage us, Ranchan and I. The yatai was my dowry..."   
  
She gasped when Ranko suddenly flared with blue light, flames that  
seemed to flicker about her without burning. She turned to the old  
crone, and said, in a flat hard voice. "Bring Papa-san here, please, Kho  
Lon." Ukyou stared, eyes wide, when she realized she could see long blue  
blades flickering in the air beyond Ranko's fingers as they twitched.  
She looked about her, and all the faces of the women about them seemed  
frightened. Ukyou realized then, for perhaps the first time, how truly  
close she had come to dying. This girl had truly believed that Ukyou was  
a boy, and that therefore she, Ukyou, must be an imposter, and must have  
done something terrible to her Ucchan... and even worse, the girl was  
really good enough to have killed her. She had been beating both Ukyou  
and Ryouga together before she stopped.  
  
Ryouga stared at the girl. He knew that she was glowing with ki. He had  
not yet begun to try to master his ki, and she had ki enough to burn? No  
wonder everyone looked afraid of her. He realized again how hopelessly  
overmatched he and Ukyou had been. Even as she fought them, she had been  
holding back because she wanted to know what they had done to her  
friend... If she hadn't, he and Ukyou would have been dead in seconds.  
  
Soon two women entered the circle, dragging a man Ukyou recognized  
between them. "Genma-san," Ranko said, and he sagged, realizing that  
somehow, he had just lost Ranko too. She had called him Genma-san...  
not Papa-san. She hated him, just like Ranma. Tears sprang to his eyes,   
but did not fall. He realized only then how much it had meant to him  
to have her affection. He had thought she was nothing more to him  
than a pawn to manipulate his son, but the pain he felt when she  
spoke to him in that harsh voice told him that he was fooling  
himself. The women who held him pulled him forward to stand before her.  
"Look at me, Genma-san." Her voice held a strong tone of command now,  
and though directed at Genma, it caught every eye in the place and held  
it to her. "You remember Ukyou don't you, Genma-san?" He shivered at her  
hard tone. "Did you engage Ranma to Ukyou, Genma-san?"  
  
"No, no," he protested immediately, "the yatai was a gift, a gift." She  
snarled at him, a menacing sound like a large cat, and he wilted. "Yes."  
  
"How could you do that, Genma-san? Ukyou was a boy."  
  
"What? No, she wasn't. You never realized?" He looked up at her in  
surprise.   
  
She snarled again, and slashed her hand across his chest. Ukyou gasped,  
as his chest was opened by four deep cuts. Genma screamed in pain, but  
even more, he screamed in anguish. His little baby girl... hated him  
enough to kill him! Ranko banished her aura, and put her hand on the  
wounds, and they knitted back together. She spoke again, as they faded  
to thin scars. "A reminder, Genma-san. Never, ever do anything to hurt  
my brother again." Genma stared, wide-eyed, fearful, and realizing  
suddenly that she was definitely no-one's pawn.  
  
Kho Lon watched, shivering. She realized finally that there was much  
less difference between the two than she had thought. It wasn't that  
Ranko was less powerful... it was just that neither responded with anger  
or even grave concern to a threat against themselves. But a threat  
against the other... and they were ready to kill, even their own family.  
  
Ranko turned, smiling happily as she bounced over to Ukyou, giving  
Ryouga a nose-bleed. She hugged Ukyou tightly. The Amazons backed off,  
raising their spears and lowering other weapons. "Hi, Ucchan. I'm sorry  
about that. Stupid Papa-san." Genma's head jerked up at that... his baby  
girl was gone... replaced by this hard cold woman... and then suddenly  
she was back? He felt a deep fear, as he wondered what damage he had  
done to his child in the name of honor, for that stupid seppuku pledge.  
Had he driven his child insane?  
  
Ukyou felt a warm glow spread through her, and the little cuts on her  
closed and faded. "Who's your friend?" She turned to Ryouga, putting a  
hand on his shoulder. He was about to jerk away, having just seen those  
same delicate fingers open a man's chest, but a soothing warmth spread  
through him, and he felt his wounds healing.  
  
"This is Ryouga. He's been with me since middle school."   
  
"Cool," she grinned, then her face turned suddenly hard as her gaze shot  
to Kho Lon, and her voice was cold, "These are _my_ friends, now.  
They're under my protection. No challenges." Kho Lon nodded slowly.  
Ranko smiled happily. "Come on, Ucchan, Ryouga, let me show you the  
village." She grabbed Ukyou's hand, and Ukyou grabbed Ryouga's sleeve,  
as she pulled them from the circle. The warriors just looked on,  
bemused.  
  
---  
  
Ukyou and Ryouga were sitting, finally, on the couch in Kho Lon's home,  
having just been dragged all over the village, introduced to hundreds of  
people, and shown dozens of places that they couldn't find again if  
their lives depended on it. Ranko's indefatigable enthusiasm had  
exhausted them.  
  
"So, Ranko, how come the Guide at Jusenkyou told us Genma was looking  
for Ranma? We intercepted a postcard a year ago that said Ranma was  
training with him. The Guide seemed to think he had been looking for   
Ranma for a long time before he finally found him there."  
  
"Cause Papa-san was lying. He was sending those postcards home so  
Mama-san wouldn't realize that he'd lost Ranma."  
  
"So... when did Genma lose him?"  
  
"When Ranma was seven."  
  
"And he just found him again, at sixteen? Wow! So where's he been for  
the last nine years?"  
  
"On another world."  
  
Ukyou and Ryouga's jaws dropped. "Huh?" said Ryouga. "Say again?" was  
Ukyou's response.  
  
"He got summoned. Papa-san had driven him insane by wrapping him in  
fish stuff and throwing him in a pit of starving cats again and again,  
and so he fit the bill for what this one guy was trying to summon, and  
gat taken there."  
  
"Genma did WHAT?!? Where is he, I'll kill him!" Ukyou shouted.  
  
"Ucchan, no, please calm down. It turned out for the best, no thanks to  
Papa-san. We ended up getting raised by a dragon, and we learned magic  
as well as martial arts."  
  
"You... you know magic? Like... real magic?"  
  
"Sure. Only, we're each kinda only good at half of it. That's why he had  
to come here. He had to free Dragon-Mama-san from a spell, but he  
couldn't do it alone. It nearly killed him, when he tried. So he had to  
come here, and let me out. He's in the mountains right now, working on  
making a body for me, so we can go back and free Dragon-Mama-san."  
  
Ryouga was having difficulty understanding most of this, but he wasn't  
really dumb, just not quick at putting things together, and he had  
gotten the idea that Ranko was Ranma's female form from the Jusenkyou  
curse. So he actually managed to ask an intelligent question. "You two  
only have the one body between you right? So if you're here, and he's up  
in the mountains, making a new body for you... What body is he in?"  
  
"Oh... Well, he isn't. He's inhabiting our ki aura... Although I suppose  
he might have made himself a body by now."  
  
"Oh. Uhm... is he as good at martial arts as you are?"  
  
"Oh, no. He's much better. I'm still trying to learn how to do the stuff  
I picked up from him."  
  
This basically blew Ryouga's mind out, and he sat silent for a while.  
Ukyou, on the other hand, was rather curious about one particular bit.  
"So you two share the same body... and its right here, not up there.  
Does that mean... uhm... could you... uh... could you show me what..."  
  
"You want to see what he looks like after so long, huh?  
  
"Yeah. If you don't mind. Should I get some hot water?"  
  
"No need, Ranma figured out how to control the curse with ki the first  
day." Otoko-Ranko said. Ukyou studied him, as did Ryouga. He was  
tall, taller than either had expected, well-built, muscular but in the  
lean sense of an athlete, not a body-builder, and trim, with no extra  
fat anywhere. Ryouga was surprised to notice that his hands were smooth,  
with none of the visible scarring, roughness, or oversized knuckles that  
usually went along with the martial arts.  
  
Then she shifted back, and was Ranko again. Ryouga, his mind back on  
track again, commented, "Not so bad having a curse if you can control  
it. Being able to suddenly be somebody else and all. Pretty cool."  
  
"Well, yeah, I guess. But he didn't take the curse for that. He took the  
curse to make me more comfortable. If he just wanted to change forms,  
well, he's been able to do that since he was nine. But you can't change   
sex that way, not really change... just the outward appearance. But he  
learned how to be a snake, or a lizard, or a cat, or a bird, and so  
forth."  
  
This reminded Ukyou of what she had been thinking about before he had  
asked about Ranma's body. "Could you show us some magic, Ranko?"  
  
"Uhm... sure... what do you want to see?"  
  
"Oh! I don't know... maybe what you just said? Could you turn into a  
cat?" Ranko didn't reply, just shrank, until she was a black cat, with  
white socks, and a red tipped tail, and red ears.  
  
"Merrowww?" She jumped onto Ukyou's lap, and rubbed against her,  
purring.   
  
"Oh! Oh, wow, sugar, that's really cool." Ukyou petted her, scratching  
behind her ears, delighting in the way she reacted, purring, and  
pushing up against the caress. Then Ranko hopped down, and back up to  
where she had been sitting, and swelled back into the beautiful redhead  
again.   
  
The front door opened, and Xian Pu bounced in, calling out her  
greetings. Thankfully, she had seen Kho Lon first, and knew to speak  
Japanese, though she wasn't great at it. "Nihao, Ranko, Xian Pu is home.  
Great-Grandmother say you have new friends, yes?"  
  
Ranko introduced her to Ukyou and Ryouga. Xian Pu eyed Ukyou, "Kho Lon  
says you after Ranma too?"  
  
"Huh? Oh! Uhm... well... His father engaged me to him when we were both  
five, and then stole my dowry. I've been... ummm... training to get my  
revenge ever since. I was supposed to exact in in blood from Genma, and  
either get it in blood from Ranma, or get him to accept me again. But I  
found out from Ranko that Genma never told him. He doesn't even know I'm  
a... a girl!" Tears sprang into her eyes at the last.  
  
"Too too bad," Xian Pu looked at Ranko, "Kho Lon told me what you did to  
Panda-man. Good good thing. Let me beat him up, next? Please?"  
  
"No, Xian Pu. You know Ranma would be unhappy if I let you do that."  
  
"Why? Ranma do it too, when he get back." Then she looked at Ukyou. "But  
he no be happy to hear this. Too too bad story. He already say, he   
accept no tie, until he free his Lady."  
  
Ukyou looked up. "Free his lady? He's already got a girlfriend?"  
  
Ranko was quick to step in. "No, no, she's talking about  
Dragon-Mama-san. She is bound by a terrible spell put on her by the man  
she loved, who betrayed her. Ranma won't even think about any other  
obligation until he's freed her."  
  
"That not true," Xian Pu protested, "he put one even before her!"  
  
Ranko looked at her. "Huh? Who? No, he doesn't. Nothing is more  
important to him than freeing her. Its what he's been working to his  
whole life."  
  
Xian Pu looked at her a bit sadly. "You not understand him as good as  
you think. There is another, even more important. He working to free her  
right now, not go back to the Lady until he do."  
  
Ranko just looked confused. "What are you talking about, Xian Pu? He  
isn't working to free anybody right now, he's just busy making...  
making... Oh..." Her eyes grew very wide as she contemplated the  
implications of this.  
  
"That right. You, Ranko, you more important to Ranma than anyone. Today,  
Kho Lon say, she see no-one more important to you than Ranma, too.  
Neither of you ever want kill anybody, ever even want hurt anybody...  
But both of you willing to kill if someone hurts other one."  
  
Ukyou looked up. "He'd... he'd kill for you? Wow..."  
  
Xian Pu looked at her, and laughed shortly. "He do more than that. Kho  
Lon say he scare Council bad, say anybody hurt Ranko, he wipe  
Joketsuzoku off map, hunt down every last child. Then you come, threaten  
Ranko, scare Kho Lon very bad. If Ranko not ask for you life, you be  
very dead." Ukyou turned green, and Ryouga looked a little pale. "Ranma  
do it too, or Council not be scared. They see through empty threat. This  
not empty threat. Ranma not only have power to do, would do. If Ranko  
hurt, Nichiezu will be no more. Ranko killed, and Xian Pu think China,  
and maybe whole world be gone." Ryouga turned a bit green at that  
thought.  
  
He protested, "He can't be that powerful. Its not possible."  
  
"Is possible!," Xian Pu retorted. "Kho Lon find way talk to Dragon Lady.  
She give us history of Ranma." Ranko stared at her. They had talked to  
Lady Alana? "Listen to what he do, for woman he never know before. Just  
after he meet her, he go away and master more than ten weapon styles in  
three months, then go and face whole army, beat the champion of a kingdom,  
at seven, then come back, learn Tai Chi Chuan to grandmaster level in  
three months, then go blind for three months, then go with Lady to face  
a dragon, and defeat a powerful evil sorcerer just cause get in way.  
Face dragon, then face greatest fear. You know about cat fist? How Genma  
wrap Ranma in fish sausage, throw in pit of cats? It so bad, he look at  
cat, and go mad. But for the Lady, who he not even really know, to free  
her, Ranma go and live with a pack of lions for a month."   
  
Tears were running down Ukyou and Ranko's faces, as Xian Pu continued  
her fiercely passionate if crudely worded account, and Ryouga was  
turning steadily paler. "Every day for nine years, he dedicate his life  
to freeing this Lady. What is so so terribly bad about her chains, that  
he must spend his life for her? She is spelled to have to love him and  
be near him. It not hurt her, she happy. All this he do, just because  
she is in chains. When he try the last time to free her, he already know  
he no can do it, but he give everything he has, he nearly die, he try to  
die, because he know that if he die, she will be free. Then, after all  
this, she finally tell him why he cannot free her."   
  
She took a deep breath, then continued. "She finally tell him, is like  
he has a sister, and she is trapped in his mind. All this he has done,  
to free a lady who knew she wore chains, and was happy about it, nine  
years he has spent every day trying to free her, and he holds his own  
sister in chains in his mind. But no no, Lady say, she is sleeping,  
and you can awaken and then free her. But you have to give up your  
manhood, and become a woman to do it. And he does! No objection, no  
second thought, no but I am a man. He go, and he do it. And he go to  
wake her, and he learn that she been awake, trapped in his mind, for  
all those nine years. Now you think what will he not do for her? Think  
of what he did for the Lady, who was held prisoner because of him, but  
not by him, and what will he not do for his own flesh and blood, held  
prisoner BY him for nine years?"  
  
She took another deep breath. "But no, you not say he won't. You say he  
can't, not strong enough. You listen then. He strong enough. When he  
seven, he face down powerful sorcerer, and free the bonds of his magic,  
which not even the archmages could do. Same day, same day mind, he twice  
create a crystal rose, something which took the man who trapped the  
dragon lady, who most powerful man on world before he die, a month, and  
leave him weak, Ranma do twice in one day, after facing maybe third most  
powerful man already same day. That when he seven! And every day after  
that was dedicated to getting stronger, so he one day be strong enough  
to free the Lady. When he eight, he create a whole new race, dragon  
lizards, by accident. He master the Neko-ken, and go beyond it, turn  
into tiger, then turn into dragon. He as close to Kami as any man can  
be."  
  
Ukyou and Ryouga just sat in stunned silence. Xian Pu turned, and took  
Ranko into her arms, rocking her softly. "Xian Pu sorry to remind you of  
bad things, Ranko, but must make outsiders understand. Anyone ever hurt  
either of you, end of world maybe."   
  
She dropped back into Mandarin. She hated talking Japanese, knowing that  
she sounded stupid, and uneducated. "I'm really sorry, Ranko, but I had  
to make them understand. I was afraid that when that boy saw Ranma, he'd  
go nuts like Mu Suu used to. I think he likes Ukyou, a lot. If he's been  
following her for a long time, and she's been focused on revenge, he's  
probably been building up a picture of Ranma and how terrible he is in  
his mind. If he lost control... well, it wouldn't be pretty, and nobody  
would be happy then."  
  
Ranko looked up at her, and hugged her, hard. "I know, Xian Pu. I  
thought the same things. But I couldn't bring myself to talk about it...  
it hurts too much. And it hurts me terribly to think how much it hurts  
him to think of how he hurt me."  
  
"Ow," Xian Pu rapped her on the head lightly, playfully, "Stop that.  
Twisty words, making my head hurt. I know... you're both hurting so  
much. But he'll come back, and you'll be free, and then you'll go free  
the Lady. Maybe then, you can both finally have a real life, without all  
the pain and misery. I hope so." She kissed the top of Ranko's hair, twirling her fingers  
idly in the fiery strands. "I wonder if Ukyou knows Ryouga thinks about  
her like that? I doubt it... she's probably been terribly focused. I  
know how revenge can be... I've seen what it can do to people."  
  
Ranko looked up at her again, smiling now. "We'll just have to help her  
see, then won't we?" They both turned then, to grin cat-like smiles,  
full of feral promise, on Ukyou.   
  
Ukyou and Ryouga had not understood a word of the last several minutes,  
though they could see that Xian Pu was comforting her. Ryouga had wanted  
to do the same for Ukyou, but held back, until she moved over to put her  
head on his shoulder, crying. He had held her then, loosely around the  
shoulder, trying to be comforting, though he didn't really know what to  
do. She finally stopped sniffling, and sat up with a weak smile at him,  
and turned to look, just as Ranko and Xian Pu gave her those feral  
grins. She gasped, looking a bit frightened.  
  
Ranko whispered, in Mandarin, "Tickle attack?" Xian Pu nodded, and they  
both lunged for the girl, knocking the couch over. Ryouga was sent   
sprawling, and leapt back to his feet, scared out of his wits at the   
sudden attack, but paused when he saw Ukyou writhing, laughing   
helplessly under the pair's talented fingers. Finally, they stopped,  
and pulled Ukyou up.  
  
"Ukyou not hunting revenge anymore, right?" Xian Pu asked. When Ukyou  
nodded, slowly, she continued firmly, "Then not need dress like boy  
anymore." She fixed a stern glare on Ryouga. "You stay down here. Not go  
outside, unless you want to be married or killed." He nodded, mystified,  
as Ranko and Xian Pu picked Ukyou up bodily, and carried her upstairs.  
  
Ryouga looked up as the door opened again, and the withered old crone  
bounced in. She looked around. "Where'd the girls go?," she asked, in  
perfect Japanese.  
  
"Upstairs."  
  
She nodded. "You play chess, boy?"  
  
"No, ma'am."  
  
"You'll learn. The board and pieces are in that box. Well, hurry up, I  
haven't got all day." Ryouga went to get the box, as directed, and  
wondered sourly if all the women in this village were this bossy. 


	6. Outside Encounters

Outside Encounters  
  
  
Ranma bounded over the trees. He was heading for a mountain that seemed  
to stand a bit apart from the others. He would climb it, and exercise  
upon its peak, in the rarified air, and see how that changed the way his  
body worked. In time, he would have a sufficient understanding to make a  
new body for himself. It had been nearly three weeks, and the bodies he  
was making were showing definite improvement.  
  
As he bounded up the rocky crags, his mind was focused on his body, and  
the changes within it. He spared only enough attention to maintain his  
upward motion, and so was completely unaware as he leapt high over traps  
and rigged rockfalls, avoiding them by mere instinct.  
  
The Lady Kima, Protector of Saffron, responsible for guarding Pheonix  
Mountain, was understandably disturbed at the description of the  
tiger-man that was even now reaching the lower levels of the open   
entrances.   
  
It should have been near impossible to scale the mountain from the  
outside, without wings. It was designed to be so, full of traps to deter  
even the most skilled. But this beast seemed to move like a mountain  
goat, springing from foothold to foothold, avoiding every trap as if he  
knew where each one was.   
  
By the time the guard made her report, and Lady Kima moved to intercept,  
the beast had already passed the upper entrances, without seeming to  
notice them. She unfurled her wings, and leapt upward. She soared from  
the upper entrance, and headed for the top of the mountain. There she  
found the man-beast, performing what looked like martial arts exercises,  
on the very peak. She stopped within arrowshot of him, and nocked her  
bow, before speaking.  
  
"To set foot on Pheonix mountain without the leave of the Lord Saffron  
is punishable by death," she stated. The beast paused in its motions,  
perfectly balanced and holding what looked like a very painful position,  
while it sniffed, and looked about. Spying her, it turned to face her,  
and bowed low.   
  
"Good day, Lady," he said, then paused and looked more closely at her,  
"Hmm... I was not aware that there were non-humans living on this  
world," he commented, thinking to himself that her appearance would have  
fit in well in his Lady's world.  
  
Lady Kima stared, as he made small talk, and bared his teeth at her,  
as if smiling. She felt indescribable fury, as he ignored her statement,  
and made no comment about the sentence she had declared. How dare this  
beast mock her? She let fly, and the arrow landed with a satisfying  
thunk, right through the heart of the beast.   
  
Ranma jerked in pain, staring at her in surprise as he fell. He hadn't  
expected so cold-blooded a response. He roared in pain when he crashed  
against the mountainside, and rolled, the arrow snapping off in his  
wound.   
  
He focused, and drew on his ki, as he grabbed the arrow and tore it from  
his chest. Blackness flickered at the edges of his vision, as he fought  
ot hold his concentration, and heal the wound in his heart before his  
consciousness faded. He succeeded, his chest was healed and his vision  
cleared, even as he slammed to a halt on a ledge.   
  
He saw the bird-woman flying down towards him, another arrow nocked. She  
let fly, and he embraced the Neko-ken, focusing his ki into his limbs,  
and snatched the arrow from the air, leaping to his feet. "That hurt!,"  
he growled.  
  
He had, on hearing her first words, considered allowing her to kill his  
body, while he left it. He had simply not been prepared for her to act  
so quickly, and so was unready to leap from his flesh, while that intent  
of his had been sufficient that he had not bothered to protect himself  
by focusing ki into his body for protection.   
  
He decided he would still allow her to carry out her sentence, but he  
would get some payback first. He roared at her, snatching another arrow  
from the air. She had a distinctly annoyed look now, and she slung her  
bow onto her back, and pulled out a sword.  
  
He grinned, a feral smile full of sharp teeth and the promise of pain,  
and pulled out a deep blue katana, and took a defensive stance. Kima  
swooped down, knowing that most humans were very inexperienced in  
fighting airborne opponents. She wasn't certain if that would be true  
for this tiger, but she would not be surprised if it were.  
  
To her surprise, he leapt, and met her in the air, blade flashing,  
ringing against her own. She parried as he fell past her, towards the  
wall, and spun to face him, only to parry again in spite of her shock,  
as he rebounded well before reaching the wall, changing directions in  
mid-air and increasing speed.   
  
She felt a sudden pulse of fear, as he whipped past her again, moving  
ever faster, redirecting his momentum seemingly at will. Her fear eased  
and a smirk grew on her face, in spite of her desperate straits as she  
frantically parried his blows, when she saw more warriors rising up  
about them, bows notched, arrows ready.  
  
He snarled, "Playtime's over, little birdy," and she felt a stunning  
blow on her back, right between her wings, and she hit the ground hard.  
She was shocked to realize that she hadn't even seen him move... from  
the speaking, which was done as he passed in front of her, to his blow,  
only the merest instant had passed, and she hadn't seen him move.  
  
She heard the twanging of bows from all around, and realized that he had  
made a fatal mistake by getting her out of the way. She rolled over, and  
was surprised when her body responded. She had, though she was trying  
not to think too much about, half-expected to be unable to feel anything  
below her shoulders. Hadn't he struck her with that katana?   
  
She was even more shocked to see that only about a quarter of the arrows  
had hit their mark... the rest were collected in his hands, though there  
was still a look of startled surprise on his face... as if he had  
expected to catch them all. He faltered, and collapsed, falling from the  
air to smash heavily into the ground.   
  
Ranma suppressed his ki as best he could, and pulled out of the dying  
body, then, as soon as he was beyond the ring of warriors, called up the  
blue flame to incinerate the body. He smirked, enjoying the startled  
expressions on the warriors, but most of all, on the Lady who had first  
attacked him.   
  
---  
  
Ranko and Xian Pu pulled Ukyou into Xian Pu's room, and Ranko shut the  
door behind her.   
  
"Wha.. what are you doing?," protested Ukyou, as Xian Pu started  
unbuttoning her shirt.  
  
"Told you. Man's clothes not right for you now. You must dress as woman  
now." With that, she pulled Ukyou's shirt off of her. Ranko started  
unwrapping her breast bindings, while Xian Pu unfastened her pants, and  
pulled them down.   
  
"Boxers?," Xian Pu snorted when she got Ukyou's pants off. Then she  
looked up, as Ranko undid the last wrap, and freed Ukyou's  
breasts completely.   
  
"Good. Is bad to hide such beauty. Women are stronger, anyway." Xian Pu  
looked at her speculatively, then down at herself. She turned and  
fumbled in a drawer, before pulling out a long cloth measuring tape, and  
wrapping it about Ukyou. "Hmmm... Wait here, I go borrow a bra right  
size. Be right back!" She bounced out of the room.  
  
Ranko turned to Ukyou, who had sat down on the bed, her head awhirl, and  
handed her a pair of pink silk panties. "Here, try these."  
  
Ukyou took them, and blushed. She was almost naked... it wasn't that she  
was embarrassed, they were all girls... But from what Xian Pu said,  
Ranko really WAS Ranma, in a peculiar way, and the thought of being  
naked with Ranma was doing interesting things to her body. She hoped  
Ranko thought her nipples were just stiff from the cold, as she quickly  
shucked the boxers, and pulled up the panties, which fit reasonably  
well.   
  
Xian Pu bounded back in a few minutes later. "Why Ryouga fall over when  
I came back?," she asked, and Ukyou blushed again, as Xian Pu held out a  
lacy black bra.   
  
"Probably because you were carrying this," she replied, taking it from  
Xian Pu. "He's rather shy about stuff like that." She put the bra on. It  
felt rather good against her skin. She had never had an opportunity to  
wear such things, and when a few minutes later she was wearing a tight  
fitting blue cheongsam, she felt wonderful.  
  
She let them lead her downstairs, and was gratified when Ryouga got a  
nosebleed and passed out upon seeing her.   
  
"Wow, he must really like you," Xian Pu said, "He your boyfriend, yes?"  
  
"Huh? What? Ryouga? Uh... no, not really." Ukyou looked down at him,  
stunned. She realized suddenly that she didn't really look much  
different from Ranko or Xian Pu at the moment... and he hadn't passed  
out when he saw them. Was it possible... did Ryouga really like her, as  
more than just a friend?   
  
---  
  
Meanwhile, the Council of the other Amazon village, the Kunichiezu, met,  
and deliberated long into the night. When the assembled elders heard the  
story of the younger women, they were dismissed, to await the decision  
with the rest of the village.   
  
Inside, the two elders who had led the morning's sortie described the  
scene at the pool. The other elders listened in wonder, then finally one  
spoke.  
  
"If he is so powerful as to awaken a water spirit, and arouse its   
desire, and yet the water spirit dares not take what she wants, then can  
we truly think to prevail against it?"  
  
"You speak truth. Remember, all, what happened to the Linichiezu, after  
they challenged a water spirit? Nothing would grow for them, and when  
they tried to irrigate, the river flooded, and washed the village away.  
We cannot fight that kind of power."  
  
There was some minor dispute of her words, but in the end they agreed.  
They were powerless to face it. "The only choice then, to save the  
village, is for warriors to volunteer, as was done in the long past with  
dragons, and we must pray he does not need too many, to do what he  
wishes."  
  
There was furious dissension, and in the end nothing was decided. They  
met again the next night, and then sent another sortie to watch. The  
reports only continued to confound them.  
  
The arguments lasted for nearly three weeks, before finally, in the end,  
they had to accept it. Their careful vigil told them how close he was to  
perfecting the male body, and if they did not act soon, he might move  
first, and that would be disastrous. Even at the end, there were  
vociferous arguments over whether they should take volunteers or  
hold a contest of arms. Finally, it was accepted that they would  
follow the laws written long ago for the appeasing of dragons. It had  
long been accepted that there would be times that a few would need to  
be sacrificed for the many, and these were laws written for just such  
times.  
  
When they finally agreed, they broke the news to the village. It was the  
young warrior, who had been with the first group to see him, who  
volunteered to be first, for it had been her reaction, she felt, that  
had confirmed their presence to the tiger-spirit.  
  
---  
  
When Ranma awoke the next morning, he sniffed critically at the morning  
air. He smelled an unusual scent... he looked around, and was quite  
startled to see the young Amazon, sleeping nearby under a thin blanket,  
smelling of jasmine.  
  
He worried over what it might mean, but decided that all he could do was  
wait till the girl woke up, and try to find out from her what the   
Amazons wanted, and why they hadn't left him alone. At least they didn't  
seem to be hunting him, anymore. She didn't look like she had any  
weapons... unless she were the bait for a trap? He stretched out his  
senses... no, she was the only one nearby.  
  
He built a quick fire, and retrieved his metal platform. Then, as he had  
all those years before, when traveling with the Lady, he pulled out his  
mat, and set about cooking a meal. He was just stuffing the dove into  
the quail, both well worked over with spices, when he realized the girl  
had sat up, and was staring at him. He grinned at her, and she cringed  
away. Sighing, he continued, stuffing the quail in the pheasant. He  
didn't realize that she had never seen such a thing before... and  
watching him pull the skeleton from each bird in turn had put her in  
mind of him doing that to her...  
  
She watched in wonder as he pulled vegetables and fruit from nowhere,  
washed them in water, and sliced them expertly. He finally looked up,  
after having set out the meal, and two places, on a low table. He saw  
her, still sitting where she had slept, watching with wide fearful eyes.  
"Come," he said, gesturing to the table, "eat with me."  
  
She crept slowly to the table, and pulled herself up to sit on the  
cushion, then watched, silent and wide-eyed, as he pulled the wakizashi  
from nowhere, and making it into a large knife, carved the birds, then  
handed her a plate piled with meat and salad. She didn't start eating,  
until he had made himself a plate, and begun eating it, himself. She had  
feared he might have been... fattening her up.  
  
Several times he tried to ask her why she was there, but each time he  
did so, she pictured him breaking open her chest, and pulling out her  
heart and eating it, and went white. She never said a word.   
  
He stood then, and she cowered, but he simply turned, and leapt over the  
water to land lightly on the large stone, where he settled in lotus  
postion. She watched, wide-eyed, as the neriad swam up, to rest her arms  
on the rock, as she listened to him play for her.   
  
Then he stood, as she watched, bobbing back to lie in the water, resting  
her head on the surface like a pillow. He began his kata, and the young  
girl sitting on the grass at the waterside felt sudden desire swell up  
in her again, as she watched his graceful motions. She stifled a gasp,  
when he leapt from the rock, until to bounce lightly off the surface  
of the water several times, before landing again on the rock.  
  
Finally, he stopped, and bowed to the neriad, saying something in a  
voice like water rushing around stones in a narrow passage, before  
turning to look at her, then leaping away into the forest. The neriad  
turned to look at her, and beckoned.   
  
She shook her head, fearful, mindful of the stories she had heard, of  
neriads luring people to them, only to drown them in their waters. But  
the Lady beckoned again, and said something in a soft voice like the  
babbling of a brook in the warmth of the summer sun, and she felt her  
desire for the tiger crest, and crash over her like a wave, and she  
stumbled, panting, to the edge of the water.   
  
The neriad came to her there, and took her in strong wet arms, and  
kissed her on the lips. Then she lifted her head, and spoke again, and  
this time the girl understood, though the voice was as before. "Now you  
can understand me child. I feel your desire for him, for I share it.  
Come, assuage your desire with me." She took the girl up in her arms,  
and carried her behind the waterfall, and stripping her of her clothes,  
made slow love to her, as the water cascaded down upon them.  
  
---  
  
Ranma headed for a different mountain this time, and stayed on the lower  
slopes. It was thus, as he danced amongst the boulders, slashing at  
them, slowly carving one into his form, and one into the form of Ranko,  
that the Lady Kima, flying a long search pattern, sighted him.  
  
She flew down to land upon a stone near where he danced, and tucked her  
wings behind her. "You tricked me," she called out. He stopped and  
looked up at her. It was then that she finally realized that he had not  
merely been slashing the stone... two of the stones were beginning to  
take on definite, almost human forms.  
  
"You again. I did not trick you. That which set foot on your mountain is  
dead, ashes now. I have no feet, no body at all, so I cannot be in  
violation of your law, and this body I am wearing has not touched your  
mountain."  
  
She felt a sudden strong fear, realizing that if he took offense at  
her actions, and attacked... well, she had not her support troops  
now, nor had they in fact suceeded in killing him the first time.  
Firming her resolve, and recognizing that had he intended to kill  
her, he could have done so when first they met, she leapt lightly down  
to stand before him.   
  
He was tall, ten feet at least, and strongly muscled. He stood still, as  
she walked about him, looking him over. "You look as you did before. If  
you are a spirit, as you imply, taking and using this body, then why is  
this body identical to the last one?"  
  
"I did not take the body, Lady, I made it."  
  
"A pity you did not give it wings, then. So beautiful a body to be  
landbound."  
  
"I am not landbound, Lady, wings or no. But if you prefer wings..." The  
creature collapsed forward, and yet it still stood before her, a glowing  
thing now. She could feel it... it was ki, pure ki. It stepped back, and  
then suddenly grew in height, and became solid. She stepped back, gaping  
in awe.   
  
It was fifteen foot tall, even more heavily muscled, and its skin was  
scaly. Its head was reptilian... draconic, really... It spread its  
wings... They were five feet from shoulder to the first joint, and  
fifteen feet from the first joint to the tip. When furled behind him,  
they reached two feet over his head, and when fully extended, as now,  
they stretched an awesome forty feet.  
  
"Lady Kima," a rich baritone drawled. "I thought you told me you don't  
consort with dragon kind?" Prince Herb of the Musk leapt from a rock  
above them, to land before the beast. "Greetings, brother," he said to  
it, bowing.   
  
"Brother?," asked Ranma, curiously. His voice was much deeper than even  
his cat's voice, and it had a strange echo to it, that made it seem to  
resonate with power.  
  
"This is Prince Herb of the Musk Dynasty. He is descended from a   
dragon," Kima interjected. She had been flying about because he had been  
reported in the area.  
  
"That does not make us brothers," Ranma replied. "There is no dragon  
blood in me."  
  
Prince Herb stared at him. "But... but... you're clearly half-dragon, at  
least!"  
  
"No. This is not my true form. This is... I think this is the ultimate  
expression of the Neko-ken. It is a martial arts technique."  
  
Both of the other two just gaped at him. This massive beast was claiming  
to be nothing more than a martial artist.  
  
"I was raised by a dragon, though," he continued, and their mouths  
dropped.   
  
"But...but there aren't any dragons in the world right now," protested  
Herb.  
  
"I wasn't raised on this world," Ranma replied, and their jaws dropped  
further. He turned to the Lady. "Well, Lady Kima. Do your laws still say  
you have to kill me?" She shook her head, numbly.  
  
Finally she found her voice. "If... If this isn't your real body... then  
where is it?"  
  
"My sister is using it, until I finish making her one. I never really  
realized before how complex a human body is."  
  
"You're... you're making a body for your sister?" Prince Herb was having  
difficulty grasping this. Ranma reached down with a massive claw, and  
gripped the shoulder of his cat body, and held it up.   
  
"Yeah, like I made this one. This is the lesser final stage of the  
Neko-ken. I think it has to do with yin/yang. You know, the tiger and  
dragon motif?"  
  
"Uh... yeah...," Herb said, staring at the massively muscled body being  
held up before him. "You made that, too?"  
  
"Yes. Making these two bodies is easy though, compared to making a human  
body." He shucked the dragon body, suddenly, and Herb gasped, as he felt  
the sheer power of the being of pure ki standing before him, as it drew  
the cat body on like clothing. The cat walked over to the two partial  
statues, stepping on the dragon body to do so. He glanced down at it,  
and suddenly, it stood up again, and moved back out of the way.  
"Better," he muttered to himself.   
  
Suddenly, he turned into a blur of orange and black and blue streaks,  
and the stone seemed to melt away to reveal a boy and girl, who looked,  
in the stone, almost like twins, though the girl was near a foot   
shorter. He drew back and stilled, as the dust cloud kicked up by his  
motions settled slowly about the statues.   
  
"She's beautiful," Prince Herb said quietly, staring at the stone that  
seemed so real it might come to life any moment. Lady Kima gazed at the  
statue of the boy, surprised to feel a stir of desire. She had never  
felt that humans were beautiful, but this boy was. "Is that your  
sister?," Herb asked.  
  
"Yes," he replied, and then pointed at the boy, "and that's me."  
  
"You're human?" they both asked together, equally startled.   
  
"Heh, yeah, sorry, I should have introduced myself, since you both did.  
I'm Fey Ranma, the Lord of Fey Castle, Founder of the Fey Musabetso  
Kakuto Ryuu."  
  
He bowed to them, then continued, "Well, its been a pleasure, but I  
gotta get back. I need to feed that Amazon before she wanders off."   
  
They both looked startled at his words, and were even more startled when  
the cat sprang into the air, and disappeared with a sharp crack. Then  
their attention was grabbed by the half-dragon, as it snapped its legs,  
launching itself into the air, lifting higher with a lazy flap from  
massive wings, before sailing off to the south.  
  
They stared at each other for a long, long minute.  
  
---  
  
Silk, the young Amazon, was sitting on the shore by a fire. The  
water-spirit had disappeared shortly after their tryst, leaving her to  
her own devices. She hadn't been permitted to bring any weapons, lest  
the tiger-spirit get the idea they were hunting him, so she made a fire,  
and kept it going, so she would have a defense if some wild animal  
decided she looked tasty. The fire the tiger-spirit had made had gone  
out while she was... busy... with the neriad.  
  
The sun had passed mid-sky, and she was beginning to feel hungry, when  
the tiger-spirit fell from the sky to land lightly near her. She leapt  
away, startled by his sudden appearance. She had just begun to wonder  
when he would get around to eating her... waiting was rather boring. But  
his sudden appearance made her realize she didn't really mind waiting.  
Not that much, anyway.  
  
He didn't look at her, just watched the sky expectantly. Soon she was  
cowering in a little ball by the edge of the forest, as a truly massive  
dragon-man swooped down, his huge wings reaching nearly from the edge  
of the forest on one side, to dip into the water on the other. As soon  
as it had settled, and firmed its stance, it drew its wings in. The  
tiger walked over to stand in front of it, and the dragon reached out,  
taking the tiger's shoulders in its huge claws, and lifted... leaving  
the tiger-spirit glowing blue beneath it. The tiger-spirit stepped away,  
and the dragon sat heavily, curling its tail about it, as it pulled its  
heavy legs in.   
  
She jerked in shock, as the discarded tiger body proceeded to sit up,  
and fold its own legs, sitting atop the dragon's legs. The tiger-spirit  
seemed to nod at them, and turn away, and as he did so, he fell into a  
much smaller form. He firmed suddenly, and Silk's mouth went dry with  
desire at the beautiful hunk of nude male flesh, before the tiger  
reached out and pulled the body up off the spirit, who swelled again to  
tiger form. Once again the discarded body seemed to suddenly reanimate,  
and it walked over to stand by the dragon.   
  
The spirit then turned to look at her. She knew, it was her time now.  
Well, frightened though she was, she would face her end like a true  
Amazon. She stood, burying her fear, and walked, face held high, to  
stand before the ten foot tall transparent blue figure. It seemed to  
regard her for a moment, then pointed to the tiger figure. She looked up  
at the tiger, confused, and the nude male body came to stand beside her.  
It took her hand, and she glanced at its face. She was deeply shaken by  
the empty look of the face. There was simply nothing there, no emotion,  
no awareness, no life, just emptiness.  
  
The body stepped up to stand on the dragon's knee, still holding her  
hand, and pulled her up. It sat her on the tiger's lap, arranged her,  
then stepped back down, and walked over to the spirit, who put the body  
on, like putting on clothing. She shivered.   
  
The boy stood before her, then glanced down, and suddenly it was clothed  
in black silk. It looked at her, and now its face was alive, its eyes  
were vibrant, a deep, brilliant blue.  
  
"You would not answer me, this morning. Will you do so now?" His voice  
was much softer in this form, much more human. "Why are you here?"  
  
She screwed up her courage to reply. Hopefully she would not anger it...  
if she said the wrong thing, and it killed her from anger, then she  
would be dooming another of her friends from the village to death. "We  
know we cannot stop you. So as with the dragons in the long past, a few  
will be sacrificed for the many."  
  
"They made you come here?" he asked, gently.  
  
"I chose. I volunteered."  
  
He sighed. "I did not want this... but you could be of use to me. But I  
think your people have misunderstood me. I need kill no-one, to do what  
I am doing, and have killed no-one in doing it. This body, that your  
people have, I assume, seen me cut and eat, is my own, a creation I  
made in mimicry of my body. It has no life apart from me. But if you are  
willing to help me, then you need do no more than sit there, and wait,  
and watch. I will not hurt you, nor will you die."  
  
She sat, looking in silence at the boy. She was terribly confused, but  
refused to allow herself to hope. She had given up her life, she would  
not embarrass herself or her people for pleading for it.  
  
He sat before her, and blue flames began to flicker about him as he  
stared at her, with flames visible in his blue eyes. She shivered as his  
eyes seemed to see right through her clothes, indeed, right through her  
skin. She felt like he could see her heart, her innermost thoughts and  
desires. Still she faced him, head held proud. She would not shame her  
people by showing her fear.  
  
Finally, as he stared at her, the body of the boy stood, and walked to  
the side of the dragon, leaving the tiger-spirit in boy form, sitting,  
staring at her. Slowly the spirit shifted, until she was looking on a  
transparent blue young woman, who suddenly became real. When it did,  
Silk gasped. It was like she was staring at herself in a mirror! Other  
than the complete lack of clothing, of course.   
  
She watched, as if in a dream, as she rose from the ground, and looked  
down at herself. She placed a hand on her own breast, over her heart,  
and Silk felt a moment of disorientation when she didn't feel a  
heartbeat. It took several moments for her to tear her eyes away from  
herself, to look down, and realize that she wasn't touching her own  
breast... her hands were lying still on her thighs. She looked up again,  
to see the boy walk out to stand before her. Then she watched herself  
reach out, to place a second hand on the boy's chest. It was as if, she  
thought, the tiger spirit were comparing heartbeats.   
  
Her eyes met her eyes, and she beckoned to herself, and so she climbed  
down to stand before herself. She reached out to herself, and placed her  
hand on her breast so she could feel both heartbeats, but she didn't  
feel anything in her hands, because her hands were still by her side,  
though she felt the hand on her breast. She smiled suddenly, and wrapped  
herself in a hug, and felt her breasts against her own. The boy reached  
out from behind her, and held her, and the naked her slumped, face going  
frighteningly dead, as the boy's face suddenly came back to life.   
  
He lifted her naked body easily in his hands, and handed it to the  
tiger, who cradled it against him. He turned to look at her, with those  
amazingly vivid blue eyes. "Thank you. You have given me the key." That  
beautiful body collapsed, and the transparent blue boy looked down at  
it, his feet still within it, and it burst into blue flames so hot she  
was forced to leap backwards. Just as suddenly, the boy was back, real,  
and standing nude before her, before becoming clothed in an instant.   
  
He smiled at her. "You have done what you were asked to do. I have  
accomplished my goal, thanks to you. I would give a gift, ere you go.  
What would you ask of me?"  
  
She shook her head sadly, looking at him.   
  
"If you insist. You are free to go, Lady." He turned to look at the  
tiger, and it leapt down, and loped over to him. He stood, looking at  
the nude body. "Now what am I going to with this? Hmm..."  
  
He heard a soft voice behind him. "Can... Can I have her?" He turned to  
see the young girl, looking intently at her own nude body.   
  
"It has no mind," he said.   
  
"Can't you give it one?" she asked him.  
  
"Not really... I could... I could give it a cat-like mind... but not one  
of a human level."  
  
"A cat would be perfect," she said, clapping her hands. He looked at  
her, and sighed.   
  
"A cat wouldn't be really happy in this body... would you object if I  
gave her cat ears, whiskers, and a tail? It would make her happier..."  
  
"Sure!"  
  
He sighed again. I can't believe I'm agreeing to do this... but I can  
at least make it happy with itself... and I did basically offer to give   
her whatever she asked for... He pulled the magic up, changing the  
body, and then gave it a tiger striped pant-suit, before giving it a  
mind, and a love for the other girl, to make sure it didn't hurt her  
unintentionally. Neko-Silk looked up, purring, and leapt down, rubbing  
her head against Silk's leg. Silk looked delighted, and ran off, chased  
by Neko-Silk. Ranma watched them go.   
  
"I hope that doesn't get her in trouble. But at least it got rid of the  
body. I really didn't like the idea of eating her body... or even  
hurting it. Its not the same as when it was just my body I was doing  
those things to... but it definitely made all the difference to have a  
human body to look at as I made a new one. Comparing my body with the  
tiger body was nice and all, but they aren't really built quite the  
same."  
  
---  
  
Ranko looked around the breakfast table that morning, at her two new  
friends, and Xian Pu, and came to a sudden decision. "Its been three  
weeks... I want to see how he's doing. Xian Pu, feel like making a  
little trip?"  
  
Xian Pu looked up, a cat-like smile appearing on her soft lips. "To  
surprise Ranma? Oh, yes... definitely."  
  
"Ukyou should certainly get a chance to meet the real thing... make sure  
she doesn't really want to kill him..." Ranko grinned at her, letting  
her know she wasn't worried. "Kho Lon, is it ok with you, if we go to  
visit Ranma?"  
  
Kho Lon considered it for a long minute. It would be risking Ranko...  
but then, there was very little she couldn't handle, and Xian Pu would  
be with them, but still... "You may go, child... if you take Mu Suu with  
you."  
  
"Wonderful! I'll go find Mu Suu. Xian Pu, start packing, ok?" Without  
waiting for Xian Pu's nod, Ranko leapt from the table, and was out the  
door.  
  
A short while later, the five travelers set out. Ranko led them first to  
the grove where she had last seen Ranma. Ryouga was the first to spot  
the exploded stone and circle of char. "What happened here?"  
  
"Oh," Ranko replied, "Nothing much. That was a power stone. I stored as  
much ki in it as my body normally holds, then when I was full again,  
Ranma tore it from me, and possessed it. Then I released the ki in the  
stone, and reabsorbed it. That's how he got his ki body."  
  
Mu Suu examined the stone, but made no comment. Ranko pointed out the  
direction Ranma had taken, and after thinking for a while, Xian Pu  
decided they should go to the Amazon village that was in that general  
direction, and see if they had seen any signs of him.  
  
---  
  
They stood in the Amazon village, facing two wrinkled old women. "You  
are serious, young ones? You seek the tiger spirit? We know where he is,  
indeed, but he is very dangerous. You should keep away. Angering the  
spirits is very bad."  
  
Ranko laughed. "He won't be mad. He's my brother."   
  
The old ladies turned white. They drew Xian Pu aside, and spoke in  
quiet Cantonese. "Is what she says true? She is the sister of the tiger  
spirit?"  
  
"It is."  
  
"But the tiger spirit said he is making a body for his sister. What is  
wrong with hers?"  
  
"Nothing. That's not her body, its his."  
  
"That doesn't look like a man's body to me."  
  
"Jusenkyou."  
  
"Oh." They told her where he was, and how to get there, but weren't done  
dispensing their warnings. "Be careful child. We sent one of our  
warriors there. When she returned, there were two of her." They pointed  
to two young warriors, who looked identical, except that one had a long  
furry tail, and was acting like a cat. "Also, there is a water spirit  
near him. He has some agreement with it, but avoid angering her. They  
can be deadly enemies."  
  
Xian Pu assured them that they would be cautious, and they set off  
again. 


	7. Reunion

Reunion  
  
  
Ranma decided that as long as he had the three bodies here together, he  
ought to get used to controlling them. He had been able to spar against  
five unseen foes by manipulating weapons with the Juushin Jisei... this  
was just an extension of that, though an important one.  
  
Ranma took the three bodies to the base of yet another mountain, hoping  
for some undisturbed sparring time. This time, his senses remained  
stretched about him, as he was no longer observing the reactions within  
his body.  
  
Ranma began sparring, steadily working on controlling the three bodies  
at once. He discovered that the human body he was in was stronger than  
either of the other two, in spite of their greater mass, emphasizing the  
difference his ki made.   
  
Realizing this, he pulled out of the body, and floated above in tiger  
form, as he controlled the sparring going on below. After nearly an hour  
of sparring, the bodies below him were moving fluidly, and fighting in  
something that actually approximated his style, though all three were  
slower and less powerful than when he was within them.  
  
This made him realize that without his ki, these bodies might be more of  
a hindrance in a fight, than a help. However, the slight drain he was  
feeling after only an hour out-of-body, made him remember that all three  
bodies were generating ki. If he could only harness the ki of the  
body... That was when he realized a vital point. He had to master this,  
or Ranko would have to do what he was doing... roam around as a being of  
pure ki inhabiting bodies. Unless she could fully master and control the  
ki the body generated, and use it instead of supplying her own and  
supplementing it with the body's...  
  
He moved the tiger and dragon each to one side, then focused on the  
human body. He started, by trying to get the body to generate a ki  
aura... but with no results. So then he shifted, and thought, maybe I  
need to be more in tune with it. He reached out with his sixth and  
seventh senses, focusing on the body's senses, on the miniscule flows of  
ki from the eyes, and the brain...  
  
Suddenly, he was looking out across the rocks, instead of down at them.  
He flicked his gaze upward... had he been drawn into the body by trying  
too hard? His gaze met the gaze of the ki form, floating in the air  
above him. The ki figure did not move. Then he looked at his hands, and  
trying to pull up ki, and his hand flared with blue light. He leapt  
lightly into the air, and studied the ki figure. He tried to move it,  
and nothing happened.   
  
He realized, finally, what had happened. He had tuned in to the body,  
until it had pulled his spirit out of the body. He pulled himself free  
from the body, and drifted up, and fell back into his ki-form. Well, at  
least that explained how to work with Ranko... if she used his exit to  
the spirit-form and entered the body... or if he left her with their  
body, and did the same himself, then the body would be really theirs.  
  
That still didn't get him where he wanted to be, and he went back to  
work, trying, from a distance, to convince one of the bodies to use some  
of its ki, to get a flicker of aura. As the light slowly failed, he gave  
in, and brought the bodies back to the water.  
  
When he reached the side of the water, after a mighty bound, he was  
startled to find several tents set up there, and a fire, and five people  
around it. One of them had brilliant red hair. She leapt up when he  
appeared, and was about to run to him, when the tiger landed behind him.  
They all jumped up, staring, and then the dragon descended behind the  
tiger. Ranma just stared, stupefied. How had she known? He had planned  
on giving her several months to get adjusted... and who were these other  
people? He recognized only Ranko and Xian Pu.  
  
Ranko shook off her surprise, and leapt for him, wrapping him in a hug,  
squeezing him tightly, feeling the strength, the realness of his body.  
"You did it! Wow, already? I love you, brother."  
  
He put his arms around her slowly, still staring at the group. "I love  
you too, Ranko-chan. But... but who are all these people?"  
  
The young woman he didn't know stepped forward, her hair long and dark.  
"I'm... I'm Kuonji Ukyou."  
  
His eyes widened, flashing with sudden delight "Ucchan...," then they  
darkened again, and he shook his head, "You can't be... Ukyou's a guy...  
Oh, no, tell me you didn't fall in the Nyannichuan?"  
  
Ranko spoke up, looking up at him. "She was always a girl. Papa-san  
admitted that he knew." She released him and stepped back, and he  
stepped towards Ukyou, staring.   
  
"Ucchan?" He still looked confused. She ran up and hugged him tightly.   
  
"Ranchan... its been so long. Its good to see you again." Then she  
turned, and left his side, to go to Ryouga, and pull him forward. "This  
is Ryouga. He was my best friend from middle school. He came with me, to  
help me."  
  
Ranma looked at him. Ryouga looked strong, and fit. "You're a martial  
artist, huh?" Ryouga nodded. "Thought so. You look it."   
  
Then Ranko was pulling Mu Suu forward. Mu Suu stepped up, and bowed  
deeply. "This is Mu Suu, Ranma."  
  
Ranma bowed back. "I am honored to meet you. You're a Master of Hidden  
Weapons, eh?"  
  
"Kho Lon told you?," Mu Suu asked, surprised. He hadn't really expected  
Xian Pu or Kho Lon to have wasted words on him around Ranma.  
  
"Nah. Its just, you'd have to be, to be carrying that many." Mu Suu  
prevented his jaw from dropping through sheer force of will. He stepped  
back, then Xian Pu bounded up.   
  
She had waited until last, because she wanted to hold him the longest.  
She hugged him tightly, glad that the events of the day had given her  
sufficient reason to do so. He felt strong, and solid. It was like  
hugging a warm statue. She stepped back. "Aren't you going to introduce  
us to your friends?," she asked, batting her eyelashes at him prettily.  
  
"Uhm... right," he said slowly, a glint of amusement in his eyes. The  
ten foot half-tiger, and fifteen foot half-dragon stepped up to either  
side of him, and then all three said, in that curious unison. "Hello,  
I'm Fey Ranma." They bowed, in perfect synchronization. Ranko clapped,  
Xian Pu gasped, Ukyou, Ryouga, and Mu Suu just gaped.  
  
Ranma took Ranko's hand, and pulled her close so he could look into her  
eyes. "There's someone I'd like you to meet, too," he said, then   
released her hand, and leapt to the rock in the depths of the pool, and  
pulled out a deep blue flute, and began playing.  
  
All five watched, shocked, when the neriad cleared the surface. Her hair  
was swept back this time, exposing her generous assets, and Ryouga fell,  
stunned. She called out to Ranma, in a voice like running water, and he  
paused in his playing, and stood, and gestured to his sister. She leapt  
lightly across the water, and then he cast his spell. To Xian Pu,  
watching from the shore, it was like a bell of doom, tolling for her. He  
was standing there, looking upon the exposed beauty of a goddess,  
against whom she could not hope to compete, and showed not the slightest  
disturbance, not the least discomfort. How then could she hope to win  
him? This was beyond iron will, of which his Lady had written. This was  
will of diamond, or something harder still. She could only hope, and  
pray, that he would soften after he freed his Dragon Lady.  
  
"Lady, this is my sister, of whom I spoke to you."  
  
Ranko sat on the edge of the stone, looking at the beautiful neriad. The  
Lady swept up close to her, and then looked between them.   
  
"You are beautiful as well, child. Will you dance together for me?"  
  
"We will," Ranma replied. Before he could act, she spoke again, glancing  
between the two of them.  
  
"But... but you are both fierce tiger," she said. "You are one spirit!"  
Her surprise and astonishment shone through her eyes.  
  
"Yes," Ranma said, smiling, "we are one." He turned to Ranko. "By dance,  
she means she wishes to see a kata. Aerial, on and above the water,  
alright?" At her nod, he tensed, and she tensed with him, and together,  
they launched into an aerial kata.   
  
All four of those on the shore were stunned. It was the first time  
anyone had ever seen the two spar, and it was amazing, and very like an  
aerial ballet. The still surface of the water began to seem like a  
solid floor, for they would land on it, and leap again, leaving only  
the very lightest of ripples. Ryouga was grateful for it, for it was so  
amazing it held his attention, keeping it from wandering to the water  
spirit and knocking him out again.  
  
The neriad too, was entranced, though she alone could truly see the  
oneness of spirit that allowed, indeed defined, the tremendous display.  
Finally, the tiger and dragon leapt to join the dance, and now it was  
truly unbelievable. To see a fifteen foot dragon set one massive clawed  
foot lightly on the water and leap again, it verily hurt the mind.   
  
The watchers on the shore might have been able to trick their minds into  
believing the surface of the lake to be solid, were it not for the  
unbelievably beautiful water spirit, that bobbed lightly, moving back  
and forth, swaying gently as the water rippled about her. She was the  
final piece that made the whole scene utterly surreal.  
  
Finally, the tiger and dragon leapt back to the shore, and Ranko and  
Ranma landed together on the rock, holding each other's hand, one foot  
on the stone, the other held high, knee bent, and their free hands  
curled under their chin, with their elbow resting on their knee.  
Everyone burst into applause. They grinned, then slid into lotus  
position, back to back, and pulled out their flutes. Ranko's  
flute was golden, the original Dragon Fang, while Ranma's was deep blue,  
the wakizashi he had made. He held out the wakizashi to her over his  
shoulder, and she nodded, and handed the Dragon Fang back to him over  
her shoulder.   
  
She understood immediately the significance of the seemingly pointless  
exchange. The Dragon Fang was, in a sense, the symbol of the office he  
held, the Lord Fey's weapon and scepter. By accepting it back, he was  
both saying that the wakizashi was hers now, his gift to her, and, in a  
deeper sense, and one that touched her heart, he was silently informing  
her that he had no intention of taking his body back from her. He had  
made a new form for himself, and would allow her to keep the body that  
had been theirs since childhood. In a way, it was an offer of equality,  
of assuring her that she need not always stand second to him.  
  
They began softly, notes only barely audible, slow and long, like a  
gentle murmuring, building to the rushing of water in a trench too  
narrow to hold it all, fading to the slow rumble of water overflowing  
its banks, moving slower, but powerfully. Ranko spun her harmony over  
and under Ranma's melody. Then they joined each other, playing in  
perfect unison.   
  
The neriad could see Ranko's eyes twinkling, as they were suddenly  
joined by a slow deep drumbeat. Ranko took off again, weaving a flight  
of fantasy around Ranma's more sedate, steady melody. She was joined by  
the trill of a piccolo, as Ranma's melody was suddenly supported by a  
clarinet.   
  
All the watchers looked about them for the players, but neither player  
nor instrument did they see. A violin picked up Ranko's flight, followed  
by a viola taking up Ranma's. A snare drum picked up the rythym, as the  
music intensified.   
  
Ryouga was beginning to sense the ki in the notes as they washed over  
him, while the neriad could see that the notes were beginning to be  
infused with magical energy. Light droplets started leaping from the  
water into the air, as if it were raining, though no water was coming  
from above.   
  
A koto joined in, lightly plucked, followed by a shakuhachi, a   
traditional bamboo flute, its haunting sound complementing the koto, and  
lending a more Japanese air to the tune. The rising water thickened,  
becoming two sets of thin ropes of water winding about each other,  
though never touching, about a foot apart as they spiraled upward. The  
rising water intensified again, forming two upward flowing columns of  
water, moving slowly about the pair of musicians.   
  
The music became steadily more focused, as each musician's set of  
instruments focused on their theme, reducing, though not eliminating,  
the connection between the two melodies. As it did so, the columns  
gained more definition, until they were water in the shape of Ranma and  
Ranko, dancing on the water about them.  
  
The two clear blue figures came together, giving the four on the shore a  
curious view of Ranma and Ranko, rippling as they were viewed through  
these watery versions of themselves. The two water figures bowed, then  
took each other's hands, and began to dance, as the music became  
suddenly suited to elegant ballroom dancing, of the fashion popular at  
the Court of Farallon.   
  
They crossed the water in a long glide towards the shore, then Eki-Ranma  
spun Eki-Ranko, spraying the four watchers with light droplets, then  
swung her back towards the center of the pool. They danced in a long  
circle around the stone, then stopped, and bowed deeply to each other,  
then bowed together to the watchers on the shore, and lastly to the  
water spirit, before collapsing back into the pool, causing a large  
ripple to spread, as the music faded, one instrument after another  
falling silent, until it was again only two flutes, and they too grew  
quieter, and finally stopped. Ranma and Ranko put their flutes away to  
loud applause.  
  
The Lady swam up to them. "Thank you. That was beautiful. I assume,  
fierce tiger, that this means you are leaving?"  
  
"Yes, Lady. My purpose is achieved, and though I had thought to give my  
sister more time amongst her new friends, I will go with them now. Yet  
would I leave you something to remember me by, Lady. I know you saw the  
threads of magic in the music. It was for more than what you saw... it  
was also for this." Ranma reached out and set a lotus blossom on the  
water, brilliant red in the center, fading to pink and finally white on  
the outside edges. "This is a memory blossom... pluck a single petal,  
and cast it upon the waters, and the waters will replay for you this  
last dance of ours, and the music we played for you. It will regrow the  
petal in a week." She reached out her hand, and pulled it to her,  
caressing it with a long delicate finger.   
  
"Thank you. I will remember you always, my fierce tiger spirit." She  
took the blossom, and holding it up in one hand, she sank beneath the  
water until only the blossom was left on the surface, and she was gone.   
  
Ranma and Ranko leapt for the shore. They were immediately surrounded by  
exclamations of congratulations, wonder, and amazement. Ranma grinned,  
and pulled out three minature lotus blossoms, crystal. He handed one to  
each of the girls. "Set them on still water, and you too can relive that  
dance. You didn't really think I'd forget you, did you?" Ranko grabbed  
his head, pulling it down so she could kiss his cheek.   
  
"Thank you, Ranma. That was sweet, and fun. A fitting gift for a  
water-spirit."  
  
"And for a spirit of fire, Red-chan," he grinned, and kissed the top of  
her head.  
  
"But I guess you weren't really thinking, Ranma." She grinned up at him.  
"After all, if the girls want to remember, and watch you, mightn't the  
guys want to watch me?" She too produced three miniature lotus blossoms.  
Ranma looked delighted. Ryouga blushed, as he took his, and Ukyou gave  
him a mock glare, and then spoiled it by giggling. Mu Suu fairly shone  
as he took his, and tucked it carefully away.  
  
Ukyou looked at Ranma for a while, before finally working up the courage  
to ask... "Ranchan, where did you learn ballroom dancing?"  
  
"Oh... I had to learn. All these stuffy parties I had to go to while  
getting to know the nobles of the Five Kingdoms. It was either dance  
with pretty girls, or listen to the blatherings of idiots. The trials of  
being an ArchMage." He sighed dramatically.  
  
Ryouga asked the next question. "Where'd you learn to do the thing with  
the water?"  
  
"Huh? Oh, I didn't. I've never done that before. It was pretty cool,  
huh? I used the music as a focus to shape the magic to make the forms,  
and we let our ki ride the melodies to infuse the forms."  
  
"You made that up? On the spot? I didn't see you discussing it..."  
Ryouga was curious and impressed, not skeptical but wondering.  
  
"Oh. Well, we did discuss it. Our spirits are one, really, so we can  
talk, no matter where we are, spirit to spirit."  
  
"You play more than flute, that just magic, or you really know how to  
play?" Xian Pu asked, hiding her annoyance at having to speak  
Japanese to be polite.  
  
"My twelfth year... Alana had run out of martial arts masters to teach  
me, so she brought in some rather esoteric martial arts masters..." He  
looked speculatively at Ukyou. "Hmmm. Ukyou, your family is the only one  
to practice Martial Arts Okynomiyaki, right?"  
  
"Yeah, its our family art. We're the only ones I know of."  
  
"I think your father was one of my masters. Made me learn to make them  
on the beach. Made me find the place on the planet that had the biggest  
waves and breakers first, too."  
  
"That sounds like Dad alright... but why didn't he attack you?"  
  
"Oh... Probably cause I was just Lord Fey to all my masters. Anyway, I  
learned a bunch of cooking martial arts, then I learned musical martial  
arts. I can use a violin like a bow, among other things. So yeah, I can  
play all those instruments. Anyway, I reckon we'll go ahead and sleep  
here tonight, since you've gone to the trouble to set up your tents.  
Tomorrow, we'll go to one of the mountains I've been practicing at.  
There's something there I want to show you, Ranko. Then we can decide  
together what we want to do."  
  
"What about you," Mu Suu asked. "We did not bring an extra tent."  
  
"So? I haven't been using a tent the whole time I was here, why should I  
start now?"  
  
"I asked, because there is room in the our tent. The tents are the same  
size, and can fit three each, comfortably."  
  
"Oh. Well, sure, why not." He clapped the two guys on the back, then  
stopped, and looked closely at Ryouga, who eyed him back nervously.  
"Hey Ryouga, when'd you get cursed? What do you turn into?"  
  
"Huh? I'm not cursed. I don't turn into anything."  
  
"Really? Ranko, come here, I want to compare." Ranko walked over, and  
stood quietly as Ranma studied them both. "Well, you're right, its not a  
Jusenkyou curse... so what is it?"  
  
"I dunno. I tell you, I ain't cursed."  
  
"I bet I know what it is," Ukyou piped up, "In middle school, before I  
met him, Ryouga was called the 'Lost Boy.'" Ryouga blushed. "He only  
managed to find his way home about once a week. I often thought he must  
be cursed. He gets lost in a room with only one door, and that's more  
than just a bad sense of direction."  
  
"You... you really think its a curse? Do you think there might be  
a cure?" Ryouga looked hopeful.  
  
"I dunno. I never really tried to cure a curse before. But tell you  
what, why don't you come with me when Ranko and I go to free the Lady  
Alana. She's a dragon, and very old, and assuming she doesn't kill us  
when we set her free, she might be able to help, or know who could."  
  
"That'd be great, man. Thanks."  
  
"No problem. Any friend of Ucchan's is a friend of mine."  
  
---  
  
Nothing dared disturb their slumber that night... not with the massive  
tiger and dragon watching over them. So they woke in the morning feeling  
refreshed and clear-headed. The four travelers watched in startled  
wonder as Ranma and Ranko pulled a table and mats from nowhere, and  
proceeded to cook a very impressive breakfast in a surprisingly short  
amount of time. After they had all eaten, they set off in the direction  
of the mountain Ranma wanted them to see.   
  
They moved slowly, land-bound, since Ranma wanted to take the time to  
get to know Ucchan again, and her and Ranko's friends. The tiger loped  
ahead of them, and the dragon strode behind.  
  
Ranma listened and commented, as Ryouga and Ukyou told the story of  
their journey. Ranko told of her meeting with Mu Suu, who blushed   
terribly through the first part, not looking at Ranko or Xian Pu. Then  
Ukyou told the story of her meeting with Ranko, and watched in surprise,  
as Ranma took the news of their engagement by Genma and her father far  
calmer than Ranko.   
  
She understood better some of what Xian Pu had said, when he listened to  
the end, and then spoke in a calm, hard tone. "I will not hold myself  
bound by my father's foolish promises. I have seen what he did. Were I  
to try and uphold the promises he has made for me, I would end up  
marrying at least fifteen women. That, I will not do. I do not need his  
name. I have my own now. Regardless, I can consider no tie binding until  
I have fulfilled my duty, and freed Ranko and the Lady Alana from their  
bonds."  
  
Ranko blushed, as she realized the truth of what Xian Pu had said back  
in the village. Ranma had just placed her name before the Lady's.  
  
Ranma took Ukyou's hand. "I am terribly sorry for what my father has  
done to you, Ucchan. Believe me, I will do all that I can to help you. I  
will not try to make restitution for all my father's misdeeds though.  
That is for him to do, should he wish to have a son again. I will do all  
I can for you, not as one who has been wronged, but as my friend."  
  
Ukyou smiled at him, and leaned her head on his shoulder. "Thank you,  
Ranchan. You were always a good friend." Ukyou didn't notice the look of  
pain on Ryouga's face, though Ranma did.  
  
They stopped midday, and ate again, and reached the base of the mountain  
around mid-afternoon. They worked their way carefully through the mounds  
of stones, until they came to where Ranma had been exercising the day  
before. It was easy enough to tell the place. Deep gouges in the stone  
left little doubt.   
  
Ranma stood in the middle of the debris, examining the ground. "They've  
been taken."  
  
"What have?," asked Xian Pu. "What was here?"  
  
"Hmmph. I wanted to show you, not tell you. I wonder where they went."  
  
"I'm sorry about that," Prince Herb said, leaping down from a stone. "We  
didn't realize that you would be back for them. When you did not return  
that day... I'm afraid we assumed..."  
  
Xian Pu looked startled. "I know you... You're the Musk Prince!"  
  
He bowed to her. "I am indeed Prince Herb of the Musk Dynasty." He  
looked at Ranma, then across the group. His mouth fell open when he  
looked at Ranko. "You... you are the vision of loveliness that he tore  
from the stone. You are even more beautiful in the flesh."  
  
Mu Suu stepped in front of her. "Stay back, Musk. She is under the  
protection of the Joketsuzoku Nichiezu."  
  
Ryouga looked at Xian Pu and Mu Suu, who bristled with anger and  
nervousness, and Herb, who's face had darkened. "Seems to be a bit of  
hostility here."  
  
Two more figures dropped into place behind Herb, two men, dressed in  
animal skins.  
  
There was a fluttering of wings, causing most eyes to glance up, to see  
Lady Kima settling on a stone. "Of course there's hostility. They're  
sworn enemies, after all."  
  
Xian Pu looked up in shock. "You... you are real? But the phoenix people  
are just a myth!"  
  
"No," Kima laughed, "We are no myth, I assure you."  
  
Ranma looked up at her. "Ranko, this is Lady Kima. She was my  
executioner, when first we met. She had me slain me for setting foot on  
the wrong pile of rocks." He grinned at Lady Kima's look of shocked  
dismay, and Prince Herb's look of lust tinged with fear, as Ranko's aura  
burst free, blue flames roaring about her, forcing everyone to step  
away, as the chips of rock that had been torn from the stones by Ranma  
were swept aside as by a high wind.   
  
"You! You hurt Ranma!" Her aura suddenly swelled nine feet, becoming  
cat-like, and then she swelled into it, suddenly a very feminine  
half-tiger. "You dared hurt my Ranma?!?" she screamed in her fury, and  
her aura swelled again, and she grew into it, becoming a fourteen foot  
tall half-dragon, reaching out with a massive claw towards the Lady  
Kima, who spread her wings, and would have leapt into the air to escape.  
  
She was too slow, as Ranko blurred, her claw wrapping about the Lady,  
lifting her up. Then she seemed to slump suddenly, and turned to Ranma,  
still holding the Lady Kima. Kima was struggling desperately, fear  
etched on her features, but Ranko didn't seem to be having any   
difficulty keeping her grip. She reached out, and set Kima on a   
different stone. Kima looked frightened, but didn't try to flee. She had  
realized that massive as Ranko was, she was still far faster than Kima.  
  
Ranko's voice echoed within itself, as she spoke. "That wasn't very nice  
Ranma." She seemed to collapse back, wings and mass evaporating as she  
became the cute little redhead again.  
  
"I know," he replied, "But I want to make sure that Lady Kima and Prince  
Herb have a very clear idea of what exactly they are facing." He turned  
to face both of them, noting in passing that the look of lust on Herb's  
face had given way to glazed look of fear.   
  
"Mu Suu was correct, but he also had it a bit backwards. The Nichiezu  
are in fact protecting Ranko, because they know if she is hurt I will  
destroy them. But as long as we are with them, they are under our  
protection as well. If you attack the Nichiezu, and they ask for our  
aid, we will give it, and you will face the fury of two dragons. So I  
suggest you forget your enmities for a while." They both looked pale and  
frightened.  
  
The group watched in silence, as Ranma turned his attention from  
the mutual enemies, and prowled among the stones. He was followed by  
most of the party, but Lady Kima and the Musk took the opportunity to  
slip away. Ranma looked until he found two stones that looked right.  
He looked at Ranko, and she smiled, and moved to stand beside him.   
  
They began running around the two stones, then leaping and bounding  
around them, bouncing off the other standing stones, and then they  
blurred with a pair of sharp cracks, and a blue glow started to trace  
their movements, and then large chunks of stone started to fall away  
from the two stones, and were smashed to powdered rubble before reaching  
the ground.   
  
The chips of stone started falling smaller and faster, and the stones  
almost seemd to be melting, as if the forms of Ranma and Ranko had been  
hidden within the stone, and they were just brushing off the concealing  
mould. The forms that they took were those of Ranma and Ranko in their  
triumphant pose the night before, hands outstretched to clasp one  
another, though not touching.   
  
When they finished, Ranma and Ranko stood proudly, each by the other's  
statue, and they pushed them together, and shifted them slightly, and  
the statues' hands clasped, and fit together perfectly.  
  
Once more they were surrounded by applause. "So, what are we going to do  
with them?" Ranko asked.  
  
"I figured we could put them as the centerpiece to a pool in the  
wisteria garden, with another lotus blossom."  
  
"Oh, wow, I bet Lady Alana would love that."  
  
"I'll just store them away for now, though." Ranma waved his hand at  
them, and they disappeared, eliciting gasps of surprise from the others.  
  
"Now, as I said earlier," Ranma continued, hopping up to sit atop a  
stone, looking down upon his friends. "We need to decide what to do from  
here. When are you all expected back at the village?"  
  
"Not for a week, at the earliest. They won't worry until three weeks  
have passed without word," Xian Pu replied, in Mandarin. To heck with  
being polite, she wanted to be understood.  
  
"And you've been away from the village for how long now?"  
  
"Today is our second day out," Ranko replied.  
  
"Then as I see it, we have three options. We can either wander about,  
doing who knows what, or we can go back to the village, or..."  
  
"We can go free Dragon-Mama-san!" interrupted Ranko, smiling with  
delight.  
  
"Exactly. But do your friends wish to come with us? I suspect Ryouga  
will..." Ryouga nodded. Ranma continued, "since it is the best chance  
for him to get a cure. What about the rest of you?"  
  
"I would love to see your castle," Xian Pu replied, eyes shining with  
eagerness.  
  
"I too would like to see your home, Ranchan," Ukyou smiled up at him,  
"especially if it means getting Ryouga cured." Ryouga felt a little  
disturbed at this. Did Ukyou mean that she would be happy to see Ryouga  
cured, because she liked him, because she would be happy for him... or  
because she was tired of having to help him, and deal with it, and  
would be happy for herself? Did she see him as a burden? He shivered.   
  
"And you, Mu Suu? How do you feel about coming to our world for a  
while?"  
  
"No objections."  
  
"Wonderful." Ranma looked around quickly, until he found a large stone  
that was significantly larger than a normal doorway, He sliced it, to  
form a single smooth plane, then etched a complex design into it, like  
the outline of a door jamb, but filled with intricate sigils. Then he  
stopped, and looked over at Ranko.  
  
"I know you're not too happy with him at the moment... I'm not either.  
But I want Genma-san to be with us. I want him to see that all that I've  
said is true. I want him to really understand that I don't need him  
anymore, so he stops trying to use us. You okay with that, Ranko-chan?"  
  
"Yeah. He needs to see it with his own eyes."  
  
Ranma nodded, and a panda appeared beside him. He looked around, and  
growfed in surprise. "You're coming with us, Genma-san. We're going  
home, to free the Lady." Ranma reached out and opened the door in the  
stone, revealing another stone wall several feet away. He pushed Genma  
through, then turned. "After you," he said, gesturing to the portal. As  
they passed through, he reached out with his ki, and the dragon and  
tiger burst into brilliant blue flames, and fell to ashes. 


	8. Breaking Chains

Breaking Chains  
  
  
In Fey Castle, where once a blank wall of stone had stood, a door now  
opened. A large panda bounced in, rebounding off the far wall to roll a  
few feet before finally stopping, and sitting up. This earned surprised  
stares from the guards at the end of the hall, but they were not  
particularly worried. Being in the household of two of the world's  
foremost magic users inured you a bit to their vagaries.  
  
They had somewhat more difficulty controlling their hormones, though,  
when Xian Pu _bounced_ through, certain portions of her anatomy moving  
in enticing ways, followed by an achingly beautiful fire-haired girl  
with a luscious figure, and a brunette with long hair and a shapely  
figure. They were followed by a young man carrying a wooden umbrella,  
wearing a yellow and black bandanna, a clothing affectation they had  
never seen before, and a young man in white robes. Their concern   
and anxiety were beginning to rise, as they considered the size  
of the invading group, until finally, a third young man entered,  
shutting the door behind him. Lord Fey had returned.  
  
"Ah, good," he said, "The sleeping hall, exactly where I wanted to be."  
He jogged swiftly towards the guards, stopping just before reaching  
them, giving them a quick salute, which they returned smartly, before  
snapping open a door and looking in. "Ah, Genma-san. Your room is here."  
  
Genma had followed him, but took a bit longer than Ranma had to get  
there. He looked in, and stopped in awe. The room was huge, the bed was  
huge, and there was a furo off to the side. His own private furo, that  
he could soak in as long as he wanted. And a dumbwaiter! It must lead to  
the kitchens. The others laughed to see Genma capering about, clearly  
thinking he was in heaven.   
  
"We'll eat supper at around seven, Genma-san," Ranma said, then turned  
to lead the others away, closing the door behind him.  
  
Genma was immediately subdued. The honorific and the name... they hurt.  
Why couldn't the boy just call him Oyaji again? Even 'Old Man' was  
better than Genma-san, as if he were an unrelated man. But Genma knew  
why. It would be that way, until Genma gave Ranma a reason to respect  
him again. Genma sighed, as he wondered how he could do that. It was  
clear to him now that he had no hope of forcing this dynamic and  
self-possessed young lord do his father's will because he was his  
father. Ranma no longer recognized the relationship. Family honor would  
not be a strong lever, for the boy could just drop Saotome, and become  
Ranma Fey, any time he liked. He was a Lord here, a Duke or something,  
Genma wasn't real clear on what. He didn't need the Saotome name.  
Perhaps he could use the need for Master Happosai's approval before the  
boy could teach... but he didn't want anything to do with the Master. He  
couldn't use Ranko, he had learned, for her reactions to his engagement  
of Ranma and Ucchan had gone beyond even Ranma's threats. "Oh, Tendou-san,  
I am so sorry. My promise will mean nothing, for I have lost my son," he  
wailed after Ranma shut the door, and left him alone in the room. Alone  
with his grief, and his failure... which lasted for about five minutes,  
until he looked about himself, and realized that he didn't really need  
the Tendo agreement any longer. All he had to do was get Ranma to at  
least tolerate him, and he could retire here, and live in the lap of  
luxury far beyond what he would have had at the Tendo's.   
  
Ranma showed Ukyou, Ryouga and Mousse to their rooms, pointed out  
Xian Pu's room to her, then guided her to the exercise hall. She oohed  
and aahed with delight at the marvelous equipment. In one corner,  
innumerable bars, just the length of the foot's width, hung in the air,  
suspended by nothing. Ranma gave her a short demonstration of the  
Anything Goes aerial style, and how to use the bars. She found it  
exhilarating, though doing it herself wasn't quite as fulfilling as  
watching him do it.   
  
He left her then, there in her private heaven, and went to collect  
Ranko. This would be his first chance to speak with her alone. She  
looked up at him.   
  
"Will you give me my body, now?" she asked softly. She felt she already  
knew the answer. The trading of flutes had implied it. But it was hard  
for her to accept the implications.  
  
"You already have it, Ranko-chan. I will keep this one."  
  
"But... but... this is your body. Yours! You're the real Ranma. I'm the  
one that's not real." She started sobbing.   
  
Ranma soothed her, stroking her hair. "Shhhh, Ranko, its okay. You are  
real. You are me. You are as real as I am, and I love you. And I have  
another gift for you. If I'm going to let you be out, always, then its  
only right that Neko should be freed of me too."  
  
Ranko sobbed again, "I don't want to be free of you. I am you. Don't  
leave me alone. Please." She finally allowed herself to speak her true  
fear. He had gone beyond the need for her... he no longer even needed a  
body. Was she losing him?  
  
[You're not free of me Ranko. Not like that. We are all still one. This  
is only on the outside. Our house is still there, we can all still go  
there, and be together. No matter how far away you are, I will always be  
there with you.]  
  
[Oh, Ranma, thank you. Thank you so much. I love you.]  
  
[I love you too, Red.]   
  
She laughed into his shirt.   
  
Ranma gently pulled away from Ranko, caught her attention, then reached  
inside himself, and pulled from within his chest a huge black panther,  
who dropped panting to the floor. Ranko looked at it with wide eyes,  
then wispered, "Neko? Neko, is that you?" and laughed joyously as Neko  
padded up to her and rubbed against her legs, purring loudly.   
  
Together, the three crossed a courtyard to a free standing building,  
built in the style of a mausoleum. Inside, they went down a spiral  
flight of steps, stopping when they came to an immense wall of stone.  
Ranma chanted something in a strange tongue, then rapped on the wall,  
and a doorway appeared in it. They walked through, into an elaborately  
tiled room, centered around a raised basin, in which floated the Lady  
Alana, submerged in golden light.   
  
Ranma explained quietly to Ranko what they had to do. He watched her in  
his mind, and waited as she sank into the meditative state, and examined  
the chains. As she began to describe them, he followed her in, and in  
their minds, they pictured what they saw, and looked, each, at the  
other's picture. To their joy, they saw that what Ranko was seeing was  
different from what Ranma saw. Ranko had been right, and they would be  
able to free Alana!  
  
Even more delightful, there was already some overlap. Ranko could see  
the masculine strands, though but faintly. Ranma could see the  
feminine strands, though still faintly. Together, they reached out,  
and brushing lightly with their ki, they watched in wonder as the first  
knots fell apart. Working together, they moved eagerly from knot to  
knot, and as they did, the dragon in Alana's ki writhed, and seemed to  
tense with eagerness, shifting between a motionless patience, and a  
twisting fury. Finally, they severed the last bond, and the bonds that  
held the Dragon in chains fell, and the bonds that tied the Lady to  
Ranma fell with them. They arose from their meditation, and watched  
the Lady, as Neko flowed between them.  
  
Ranko cried out in joy, as Alana rose from the water, and flowed from  
the form of a mature woman, into the long sinous coils of an ancient  
dragon, her coils slithering across one another as she floated in the  
air before them, face inscrutable but wise, eyes with depths upon  
depths, flame curling from the edges of her mouth.  
  
Ranma and Ranko stood before her, silent and waiting. They had both  
accepted that if the Lady chose to take their lives in retaliation for  
her years of bondage, they would not resist. The only sign of the fear  
they held within, was Ranko's hand, seeking for Ranma's, and grasping it  
tightly, as Neko's purrs rose from beneath them.   
  
Finally the Lady spoke, in her own voice, free of bondage, and  
awesome as the heavens. "You surpassed me in wisdom, child. I thought  
that only be becoming one again could you be whole and free me. You have  
become three now, and yet are more whole than when you were one. And now  
I find that though you have freed me from the bonds Fey laid upon me  
through his treachery and deceit, yet I am not free from my bonds."  
  
Ranko burst into tears, and put her face in her hands. Ranma spoke  
calmly. "Lady, it worked, I know it did, We sundered the bonds, we found  
every knot. They are gone, there are no more!"  
  
The Lady spoke again, and Ranma fell silent. "Yes Child, it worked. As I  
said, the bonds that Fey laid upon me are gone. But the bond of love for  
you that I have laid upon myself is as strong as ever. The love of a  
proud mother for her children, grown strong, for whom she need fear  
nothing. Will you accept my love, children? Will you be my children?"  
  
Ranma and Ranko looked at each other. [We're not giving up on Mother,  
Red. We're just getting another Mother. Think you can deal with that?]  
He did not seem to notice, or perhaps simply understood and accepted,  
her tears.  
  
[Baka,] she replied gently, [If you can, I can. I am you.]  
  
They knelt before her, and Neko lay still. "Mother," they said  
together, as they looked up at her, beauty incarnate before them, "we  
are your children." Their voices sounded as one voice, every note and  
inflection identical, matching in every way except pitch. Ranma's eyes  
were clear, but Ranko's overflowed with tears of joy.  
  
"Well said, my children. If my children you would be, then my blood  
must mingle with yours." So saying, she became a woman again, though  
now her true beauty shone through like a beacon. She stepped forward.  
"Draw your sword, Ranma Fey, and let our blood become as one." She took  
his sword, and cut his arm, and hers, and pressed the wounds together.  
He felt the shock of her blood entering his, and it spread like liquid  
fire through him. Ranko stared in awe, as he glowed golden, then gasped  
as the golden glow flowed on, filling her and Neko as well. It soared  
through her, burning away her tears, and she felt the fire in her veins,  
and smiled in delight and happiness as Neko roared.   
  
They mounted the steps slowly. The glow had faded, leaving them feeling  
rather weak, and yet paradoxically, immensely strong. Though the glow  
was gone, still their skin seemed to hold a golden tint, and their eyes  
flashed gold as they looked at each other. Looking deeper into each  
other's eyes, they realized that their eyes looked like Neko's now,  
a vertically slit pupil, and they grinned at each other.   
  
Hand in hand, they walked finally out of the mausoleum, to find Xian Pu  
and Genma there, with five guards before them blocking their way. Ukyou,  
Ryouga, and Mu Suu were standing some distance back, watching. Xian Pu  
was trying to get Genma to calm down.  
  
Genma was frantically arguing with one of the guards, insisting that the  
roar had meant trouble, and that they had to go and help. He cut himself  
short, as he saw the pair stepping forth from the building, Neko loping  
beside them. They looked golden. From behind them came a glowing light,  
and a beauteous woman stepped into view, light spilling from her skin  
like water, to fall all about her. The guards parted like a curtain  
before them.   
  
"Father, friends," Ranma and Ranko said, their voices in a curious  
unison, saying the exact same words at the exact same time, with  
identical intonations, but different timbres, "we want you to meet our  
Dragon-Mother Alana." Genma just stared, shocked beyond words.  
Dragon-Mother? What on earth did they mean... and how could anyone be so  
beautiful?   
  
Xian Pu, on the other hand, knew what to do in the presence of a dragon.  
She immediately dropped to her knees, and put her hands before her on  
the ground, and rested her head on them, then spoke, "It is my very  
great honor and privilege to meet you, Venerable Lady."   
  
Alana laughed, and her laughter was like the chimes of heaven, and she  
spoke. "Rise child. You need no ceremony with me. You are a friend of my  
son and my daughter, and that is enough for me."  
  
Xian Pu rose immediately. "We were worried, Ranma. We thought we heard  
you roar."   
  
"You did," and this time Ranma spoke alone, as he stroked Neko's fur,  
and scratched behind his ears. "Neko spoke aloud in his joy."  
  
Xian Pu looked at him for a moment. "You are talking funny, Ranma.  
Where did you get the big cat?"  
  
"This is Neko-Ranma. You saw him once before. It can be a bit  
embarrasing having a human boy behaving like this around you, so I gave  
him a proper cat's body."  
  
Xian Pu leaned closer, looking up at his face. "What happened to your  
eyes?"   
  
Alana had been steadily dimming behind them, and when she spoke now, her  
voice was still beautiful, but as a human's voice might be, not the  
voice of dragon. "They accepted me as their mother, and became my  
children."  
  
Genma could hold it in no longer. "Your children? Yours! But what of  
their mother? What of my wife? We were to go and meet her in the spring.  
Is she to be left alone?" He could not keep the fear from his voice. He  
knew that if he returned without Ranma, he would be committing seppuku,  
and even worse, he would be leaving his wife completely alone.  
  
Ranko laughed, and hugged him. "No Papa-san. Mama-san is still our  
mother too. We have two mothers now." Her voice fairly shone with her  
joy.  
  
Genma sighed with relief. "Good, then can we eat?" Ranma laughed at him,  
but nodded, and led the way.  
  
As they left the grounds of the mausoleum, they passed several smaller  
gardens, and suddenly the Lady gasped in awe, and they all stopped to  
see what had caught her attention. In a small garden plot, surrounded by  
a low stone wall, the shattered remains of what had once been a crystal  
vase lay amidst the pieces of a marble pillar that had held it up, both  
cracked and shoved aside by a crystal rosebush, flooded with white  
blossoms. "Oh," cried Ranko, "Its beautiful!"   
  
The Lady smiled, and nodded. "It is a promise, fulfilled." She hugged  
them both again. They all looked at in in awe for a while, as another  
few blossoms opened, and the scent carried the sweet rich scent to them.  
  
That comment made Xian Pu think of the peculiar crystal flower in a vase  
in her room at home. Some strange crystal, that smelled like it was  
alive, she had thought at first. She had felt sorrow, when the first  
petals fell from the rose. She had thought it was a gift that would last   
forever, but apparently it was not.  
  
When the bud had finally fallen, she felt heartbroken, until the next  
morning, when she saw a new bud forming. When it reached full bloom, she  
had gathered her courage, and plucked it from the crystal stem. Indeed,  
the next morning, a new bud had formed.   
  
The second blossom, the one she plucked, never dropped its petals. It  
floated now in a small bowl of water, and around it floated the other  
beautiful petals, fallen from the first blossom. There were a few  
missing. They had gone to Kho Lon, who was steadily trying to figure out  
what they were made of, and which magic potion they would be good in.  
  
Kho Lon had found, when she first bit one of the petals, that crystal is  
not a good thing to bite, and she had been forced to let Xian Pu  
carefully pluck the pieces of glass-like crystal out of her mouth.  
Later, she had set one on her tongue, and after a few minutes, it had  
dissolved quite suddenly. Her arthritic pains, which she normally  
suppressed with ki, had simply vanished for a week, and when they  
returned, they were lessened. Peculiar, but not overly informative.   
  
She had mixed the petals into several potions, and observed that they  
dissolved, but had not been able to isolate the effects they had had.  
She had been surprised to note, however, that the petals that fell in  
the water in Xian Pu's room didn't dissolve in it.   
  
---  
  
When they entered the dining hall, Ranma was quick to make Lady Alana  
take the end seat, the seat of honor. Not only was this the day of her  
freedom, but he didn't want to deal with the confusion over whether he  
or Ranko should sit there, or what it might mean either way. Instead, he  
and Ranko sat on either side of the Lady. Xian Pu sat beside Ranko, and  
Mu Suu sat beside her. Beside Ranma was Ukyou, and then Ryouga, and  
finally Genma.  
  
They ate in silence, each busy with their own thoughts, until the repast  
was finished. Ranma leaned back in his chair, and looked at Lady Alana.  
"Lady, you know that Ranko and I must leave again, and try to come to a  
reconciliation with my first mother. I do not expect it will be easy. We  
will return to you, eventually, but I cannot give you any guarantees. It  
may be a long time, before we return. I will leave the Land of Fey in  
your hands, and know that it will be well looked after. But we have a  
problem to lay before you, and maybe with your wisdom, we will solve  
it."  
  
Ukyou was staring at Ranma through this speech. Ranko was far more like  
the Ranma she had known, than this man beside her, speaking so   
eloquently, and with such quiet power. She shivered at the thought of  
what would have happened had she faced him first. He might have decided,  
as Ranko did, that she had done something terrible to his childhood  
friend... but would he have allowed his pain to stop him? Looking at his  
calm poise, the complete control he held over himself, in spite of  
having just achieved the goal to which his life had been dedicated for  
nine years, she did not think his pain would have, or even could have,  
stopped him.  
  
Ranma turned to Ryouga. "Ryouga here is a friend of Ukyou, who is a  
friend of my childhood. He is cursed, dear Lady. He has been cursed with  
a terrible sense of direction. I invited him to join us here, because I  
thought that you might have some insight on how to rid him of his  
curse."  
  
The Lady looked at Ryouga, and smiled gently. "Come here, child, and let  
me look at you." She pushed the heavy chair back, turning it, so that as  
Ryouga came to her, she could face him with no barrier between them. She  
took his head in her hands, and as she did so, her skin took on a golden  
hue, and her eyes glowed with a golden light.  
  
She looked deeply into his eyes, and he found himself lost in their  
depths. They seemed ageless, deep still pools of the distilled wisdom of  
uncounted years, and he seemed to lose himself in them forever. Finally,  
she released his head, and sat back, sighing.   
  
She looked at Ranma. "I know of nothing that can help this man."  
  
Ukyou sighed, and Ryouga's eyes flicked to her. Why was she sad? Was it  
because she wanted to be free of him? Was she sad for him, or for  
herself? He wished he knew. He had felt his feeling for her grow  
steadily over time. When she had faced Ranko, and been defeated, and  
later, when she had faced Ranma, and accepted that he was not hers, and  
given up her quest, he had been torn. He was terribly happy that she was  
no longer driven, she could think of other things now, do whatever she  
wanted. He was also desperately afraid that she would leave, and he  
would have no reason, no excuse to stay by her side. She was here to see  
Ranma's home... and him cured. If he were not cured, would she leave  
him? Or would she stay with him until he was cured, and leave then? Did  
she perhaps see it as an obligation? To help him, as he helped her, so  
her debts would be paid, and she could leave him without guilt?  
  
"You know the one who can help him, Ranma. Do you not?"   
  
Ryouga looked up at the Lady's words. Hope and fear warred in his heart,  
and he did not know what he wished more... for Ranma to agree, and tell  
him, or for the Lady to say that it wouldn't matter, couldn't work, and  
leave him to return to his own world with no cure. Did he hope and wish  
that Ukyou wanted to see him free because she... she liked him... or did  
he want there to be no cure, so that he would still need Ukyou, and she  
would have a reason to allow him to follow her.  
  
"Sylie. I cannot go with him, though. Nor can you, Lady. My people need  
their leader. Who can guide him? Beorn, perhaps."  
  
"Beorn and Li can guide him to Sylie."  
  
Ranma looked at her, showing his surprise on his face for the barest  
instant. "Li has returned, then? Was he successful?"  
  
"He would not say. He said only, 'it is over.'"  
  
Ranma turned to Ryouga. "There is one who could help you. She is an  
elder dragon, and she cured me of the fear induced by the Nekoken. I  
cannot go with you. I must return, and find my mother, so that Ranko can  
have a family."   
  
Ranko looked up, startled again at being put first in Ranma's thoughts.  
Was her happiness truly that important to him? Why? She was him, so it  
made some sense... but not that it would be more important than his  
own.  
  
"I can offer you two guides. Both have experience in this world, beyond  
my own realm, and both are masters of my school."   
  
Genma looked up in surprise. "Ranma, what  
have you done? You know you cannot teach until the Master licenses you!"  
  
Ranma looked over at Genma. "I trained under the Master for three  
months, and won my license from him when I was seven, Genma-san."  
  
Ranma looked back to Ryouga, ignoring his father's shocked  
expressions, and sputtered protests, "There are sufficient masters now  
to hold the dojo in their absence. They are masters of ki, as well, and  
can train you, if you wish it. You have great potential. As for Sylie,  
they can lead you to her. Dealing with her will be up to you. If you  
choose to go, the Lady Alana can return you to our world, when you make  
it back here. Will you go, or will you return with us?"  
  
Ryouga looked at Ukyou. He knew she wanted him to be free of his  
curse... he just wished he knew why. It didn't matter. She wanted it,  
and he did, even if there were reasons to consider retaining it. He  
could not back away from this. "I will go, and seek my cure."  
  
"I will go with you, if you want me to come, Ryouga." Ukyou said,  
looking at him. His face lit up with a wide smile, and she wondered. She  
had become attached to him. He was a good companion, and now that her  
entanglement with Ranma was over, Ryouga was the person she was closest  
too. But his reaction was so... so powerful. Did it really mean so much  
to him? After all, it was merely doing for him what he had done for her.  
"It is the least I can do for you." She was shocked at the way those  
words, meant kindly, nonetheless wiped the smile from his face. He  
nodded though.  
  
---  
  
Arkus stared at the message he had just received by crow from his spy in  
the castle of the Lord Fey. "Fey has returned!," he shouted, exulting.  
"Finally, I shall destroy him forever!" Arkus found himself filled with  
new energy after the enervation of being unable to even find the  
slightest hint of his enemy's whereabouts. He moved with a speed he had  
forgotten down the halls to his summoning room.   
  
The circle was ready, the ritual prepared, his power was at its height,  
this time Fey would die! Arkus began the ritual, and several hours after  
dark, Arkus left his castle in the company of a being wrapped in  
darkness and cloaked in evil, though not before setting in motion the  
final stages of a trap that he had spent months preparing.  
  
Ranma, Ranko, and the Lady Alana suddenly sat bolt upright, heads  
cocked, listening and feeling the weight of untold evil as it approached  
their demesne.   
  
"Arkus," Ranma and Ranko said in unison.  
  
"And something darker," warned the Lady.  
  
Ranma looked at Ranko, "I'll face the challenge head on, you suppress  
your aura and work around till we can get them in a V attack. My bet is  
that Arkus doesn't know about you." He turned to his Lady, "Lady, I'm  
also betting that he doesn't know you've been freed. If you would, could  
you guide my friends to the parapets? If needed, you can act from there,  
and take them by surprise, and until then, my friends can watch, but be  
safe."  
  
"I will do as you ask, my Lord," she replied, bowing to him. Ranma  
nodded, encased suddenly in golden armor, and he raced from the room  
towards the front lines. Ranko kept her wakizashi hidden, not wanting  
its magical aura to reveal her presence, and she leapt from the window  
to work her way around the castle.   
  
Alana led the rest of the small group, several of whom protested that  
they should join the fight, though none were willing to directly act  
against the lady, up to the balconies, the parapets upon which the   
archers would defend the castle in a normal defense, that they might  
watch the battle unfold.  
  
Arkus stood proudly, wearing his finest fighting robes, ready to unleash  
magical fury, before the gates of Fey castle, his minion hidden in the  
darkness behind him, held in reserve for a surprise attack that would  
utterly destroy the upstart whelp.  
  
He laughed as Lord Fey strode from the gate, wearing his golden armor,  
and wielding that damned sword. "Today it ends, Lord Fey! Today I take  
your life, and your woman, and your lands, and most of all, today I take  
back the divine gift that you stole from me when you took my enemy's  
life!"  
  
Fey Ranma felt a cold rage boil in him at the words. How dare he  
threaten the Lady! Yet that rage boiled beneath a wall of ice, and no  
sign of it appeared on his features. "Arkus, since I first came to this  
world, you have plagued me. This is the last time, Arkus. I am tired of  
playing your game."  
  
Fey released his hold on the Juushin Jisei Juuryoku, just a bit, and his  
aura sprang into snaking cerulean flames, then he released his hold on  
his aura, and it sprang into full life, blazing about him, reaching  
nearly twice his height.  
  
Arkus grimaced. That damned blue flame was the one spell of Fey's that  
he'd never managed to duplicate, or even understand. No matter, it would  
not avail him, for Arkus would not be denied. He summoned his first wand  
to his hand, and launched a mote sized point of light at his opponent.  
  
Ryouga, standing on the parapet, laughed to his companions. "Man, does  
he really expect to hurt Ranma with that peashooter?"  
  
The mote reached Fey, and just before it would have impacted his aura,  
it blossomed into a searing sphere of flame that engulfed Fey   
completely, hiding him from view, concealing even his brilliant aura.   
  
"Oh," muttered Ryouga.  
  
Ranma focused, noting idly that the Lady's gift of blood seemed to have  
had more of an effect than he had realized, for though he felt the  
searing heat, it did not bother him, even before he focused his aura  
against it. He concentrated, remembering the several techniques he had  
learned for absorbing magical and normal energies, and focused his ki.  
  
The flames were suddenly sucked inward, leaving trailing wisps of smoke  
to be forced away by Fey's aura, still intact. He looked entirely  
untouched, though there was a light tinge of red to his aura.  
  
Arkus growled, and pulled out a different wand, brandishing it at Fey,  
and a bolt of lightning streaked from it. It impacted with Fey's aura,  
and he forced a grin, gratefully absorbing the extra energy, but   
increasing his hold on his aura to prevent the increase from being  
noticed. So nice of Arkus, to help beef him up, but damn, that was a lot  
of energy to soak at once. If Arkus realized, he could overload him  
pretty quickly. Better get rid of some of it.  
  
Fey lifted his blade, and retaliated with a peculiar bolt of what looked  
like green lightning, otherwise identical to Arkus's blast. Arkus  
disappeared, reappearing five feet away, allowing the bolt to pass  
harmlessly through his former location. He laughed. "Ha, Fey, you'll  
have to do better than that!" He waved the wand, and chanted something,  
and a shadow fell across the field.   
  
The watchers on the parapet looked up to see an ominously black cloud,  
and even as they did so, it flared a brilliant white, and a bolt of  
lightning crashed down from above, slamming into Fey. They looked on in  
shock and dismay. That bolt was at least six feet wide, and it wasn't  
stopping!  
  
Finally the lightning dissipated, and the cloud was ripped apart by a  
breeze too high to feel, and when they could see again, Fey was still  
standing, aura blazing, and they could see ripples of electricity  
flashing across his armor.   
  
[I'm in position Ranma.]  
  
[Hold until he brings on his toy, Ranko. I can take whatever Arkus is  
dishing out, so I want you in reserve for that. So far all he's managed   
to do is fill my reserves.]  
  
[Gotcha.]  
  
Arkus screamed in fury at the failure of one of his more powerful attack  
spells, and began castign, weaving a spell this time, rather than using  
a wand.   
  
Ranma eyed the spell, and decided it was time to stop being stoic, and  
start introducing Arkus to what he was really facing. Besides, it rather  
looked like that would hurt when it hit. He examined it carefully, even  
as the deep azure sphere left Arkus' hands and hurtled towards him.  
Ascertaining that it would do no harm to the castle when it hit, he  
leapt easily out of its way.   
  
Arkus chuckled, and shouted, "You'll not escape my vengeance so easily,  
Fey!" Ranma realized instantly what Arkus meant, for the azure streak  
had zipped past, but immediately pulled around, coming at him again,  
rather than impacting the castle walls. Ranma led it towards a tree,  
noting that Arkus was casting again, but forced to focus on the sphere  
to avoid it. Standing firm before the tree, he waited, and at the last  
possible moment, used all his speed to dodge. When he saw the tree  
become stone, instantly, he was very glad he had avoided it, rather than  
taking the punishment.  
  
Even as he was congratulating himself for the successful avoidance, he  
sensed more incoming, and leapt to avoid them. Multiple silver streaks  
passed beneath, but Arkus was being more cagey this time, and had held  
some in reserve, and as Ranma leaped, he fired more. Ranma, who had  
momentarily focused on the silver streaks to determine what manner of  
spell they were, moved just a hair too slowly to avoid the new attack,  
and was slammed into by an immense force.   
  
He halted his supersonic flight with the Juushin Jisei, then leapt to  
the side to avoid another attack, as golden flashes of light speared  
past.   
  
Ranma fired several quick ki blasts followed by magical arrows of force  
at Arkus, to give him a moment to recover his bearings, and hopefully  
disrupt whatever Arkus was in the process of casting.  
  
Arkus teleported out of the way of the attack, and fired a sickly green  
beam from a wand. Ranma sought to avoid it, but it twisted in the air to  
meet him, and unlike the azure sphere, ignored momentum and inertia. The  
beam hit him, and Ranma realized the severe error he had made by trying,  
as he usually did, to fight on an even level with his opponent, as he  
could feel his ki being drained.   
  
He screamed in pain, and ignoring his ki, afraid to use it while this  
attack continued, threw magic threads into a shield using the old  
techniques the traditional mages used. Finally he managed to force the  
beam away, and with that momentary respite, he let out the Juushin Jisei  
Juuryoku until he was back at his prior ki level, then lashed out with  
his ki, and used his skill in dispelling to unweave the magic of that  
hideous wand.   
  
Arkus was gloating, delighted in the success of the attack, for he was  
the recipient of the drained energy, and he had received such a surfeit  
of power from the attack that he could be forgiven for believing the  
Lord Fey to be drained beyond any ability to recover.   
  
His fury was unmatched, then, when the Lord Fey appeared before him,  
aura undimmed, and fired a blast of blue fire at him. Arkus teleported  
away, then felt his teleport ring's magic dweomer collapse into  
nothingness. He attempted to fire the draining wand again, only to  
discover that it was now an unmagical stick. He cast it aside in anger,  
and retrieving his lightning wand, moved to attack with it.  
  
It too lost its magic as soon as he moved to use it. Ranma was tired of  
being on the defensive end of this fight, and was steadily divesting  
Arkus of his advantages. He fired another small ki blast, and when  
Arkus' instinctual attempt to use his teleport ring failed, he was too  
late to avoid the blast, and was knocked back, the wind driven from his  
lungs.   
  
Moving quickly to try and throw the Lord Fey off-balance to give him  
time to make a more competent attack, Arkus cast a quick and easy spell,  
turning the ground on which the Lord Fey stood to mud. Ranma recognized  
the casting, and rather than acting against it, and perhaps giving Arkus  
time to respond, he focused the Juushin Jisei, holding himself above the  
mud, and threw a massive dispelling at Arkus, hoping to both disrupt  
whatever Arkus was casting, and perhaps take out some more of his  
magical objects, those wands and rings that were allowing him to keep up  
such a pace.  
  
Arkus screamed in fury as he felt several more of his wands fail, and  
the spell he was beginning die as well, then pulled out all the stops,  
pulling out two wands and snapping them before Fey had a chance to  
dispell them. Their energies began mixing visibly before him in the air   
before them, as he prevented their explosion. Finally a ball of sickly  
green and black energy floated before him, and he looked at Fey,  
gloating. "Even if you survive this attack, Fey, your castle and home  
will be destroyed!"   
  
Arkus laughed, evilly, not  
noticing Fey's sword lifting, as a thin beam of ki speared out,  
impacting almost unnoticeably with the sphere, doing nothing more than  
holding it in place, for the moment, but ready to throw it off course  
the moment it moved, or expanded. Arkus stopped laughing, not seeing the  
ki, as the globe obscured his view of it, and shoved forward, a move  
that should have sent the ball flying. It was held by Fey's ki though,  
and the result was Arkus driving his hands directly into the ball, and  
screaming in agony.   
  
[Damn! I didn't think he'd be stupid enough to still try and attack, I  
gotta help him!]   
  
Fey's ki beam rose and fell, slicing the ball, dissipating it, but Arkus  
collapsed to the ground, black and green energies still swirling about  
him. Fey ran toward him, but a sudden blackness moved over Arkus, coming  
between them.  
  
"Now you must face me!," roared the dark beast, piercing his own shroud  
of darkness with a dark red flame that appeared, licking about the  
massive sword he held. The sound of a whip cracking was followed by  
flashed of blue and white light, sparks flying from the end of the now  
visible flail.  
  
[Damn, I bet he wants Arkus to die, so he will be free of whatever  
compulsion is on him. He's going to keep me from Arkus, Ranko, can you  
get to him, I'll lead big ugly off here.]  
  
Fey faded back before the beast, who laughed, then roared in triumph.  
Fey drew in his ki about his sword, so that it glowed with golden  
flames, then shot a beam of ki at the beast.   
  
It blocked it with its own sword. "Unlike yon fool, I know about the  
power of the spirit, boy, it will not defeat me so easily!"  
  
Fey allowed his posture to show concern, as he carefully lead the beast  
away from Arkus, but before Ranko could reach him, the beast realized  
it, sensing her presence now that she was closer, and turning, unleashed  
a blast of dark lightning, then fired flame from his sword, lighting a  
circle of hell-spawned fire about the wizard's crackling, pain-wracked  
body.  
  
Fey roared in anger, and rushed the beast. Their blades met with a flare  
of light, then again and again. As he had before, so long ago, Fey  
matched the beast's skill, taking the time to learn what he could. He  
wanted to keep the beast occupied, and give Ranko time to make it  
through the flames.  
  
The watchers viewed the scene with trepidation, unable to see clearly  
what it was that Fey was facing, but clearly seeing the flash of light  
from the impact of the darkness and the light.  
  
Ranko was using her wakizashi, her own ki flaring, to carve through the  
demon's red flame, and make her way to the dying wizard. She finally  
reached him, and knelt by him, focusing on her training in the Amazon  
village, turning her ki a brilliant white, as she poured it on him. He  
looked up at her, through eyes filled with pain, that suddenly cleared.  
"I have lost, and in losing, I finally see how I have failed. In  
attacking innocence, I betrayed my own oaths, I fought against evil  
once, now I have fallen into it. Forgive me, if you can." His eyes fell  
shut.  
  
"I forgive you," Ranko whispered, then jerked back, realizing the  
implications. Though she had purged him of the fire, he would not be  
healed if he did not fight for life, and he was not fighting. "No! Don't  
give up, you can still live!," she screamed at him, tears springing to  
her eyes. "Please!"  
  
He opened his eyes again, looking on her, "Now you have the final prize,  
child, all is as it should be." His eyes closed, and his breath rattled  
in his chest, then stilled. Ranko screamed in fury. If only that beast  
hadn't slowed her down!  
  
Her aura burst forth, a pure white, and washed away the red flames, and   
Ranma, sensing it, stepped up the attack, ceasing to merely match the  
beast's skill, but surpassing it, pushing himself to move fast, pouring  
ki into his limbs. The heads of the flail fell, severed, one by one, as  
the demon roared in sudden confusion, then laughed, as it too increased  
its skill, and Ranma felt the darkness about it grow. "You're not the  
only one holding back, insignificant pest!"  
  
It spun away from Ranma suddenly, feeling a pure power from behind it,  
like that of an angel, fearing that it faced a second attack. It saw  
before it what did veritably look to be an angel, haloed in an aura of  
pure white so intense that to look upon it burned it, and even as it  
realized this, a blade burst through its chest, glittering with golden  
flames, as Ranma took full advantage of his enemy's distraction.   
  
Instantly recognizing its peril, should its opponents use that  
powerfully enspelled blade to funnel their spirit into its innermost  
being, it lunged forward, ripping itself from the blade. It leapt to the  
side, out from between the two, and faced them, dark flames roaring  
about it.   
  
It snapped its flail, and the heads regrew. It lunged for Fey, and  
moving impossibly fast, slammed its fist, hardened by the sword hilt it  
held, into Fey's chest, sending him flying back across the field, then  
turned to face the angel.  
  
"You are too late, servant of Light! My summoner has died, and I am  
freed. This world is Mine!"  
  
Ranko screamed in defiance, and fired a blast of ki at it. It batted the  
ki aside almost casually, only to discover that it had been but a  
distraction on Ranko's part, for she was now within its black flames,  
her own sword piercing its side.   
  
It threw itself backwards, enraged beyond belief that these puny mortals  
had twice managed to pierce its defenses, and defile its flesh. It leapt  
forward again, casting aside its flail, to grab the now armored angel  
about the throat. It began draining her, and it groaned in pleasure as  
the pure power coursed through it.   
  
Its pleasure was cut off, quite literally, as its arm below the elbow  
fell to the ground, and it bellowed in pain, darting back on wings of  
black flame. It roared, as its black aura flared, and a new arm shot  
forth from the bloody stump.   
  
"Playtime's over!" With a shattering roar, it cast black flame at its  
tormentors, the male now standing beside the angel, lending her his  
strength.   
  
Ranma leapt, pushing off against Ranko so that she too was driven out of  
the way of the dark blast. [Ranko, we need to power up. Go half-dragon,  
so at least we'll cut down its size advantage.]  
  
The demonic beast gaped as both auras flared twice, and its opponents  
became great winged beasts. Was it mistaken? Was it perhaps facing other  
demons here?  
  
It fired another dark blast, and this time, it was Fey who batted its  
attack aside as if it were nothing. It leapt back to the attack, pushing  
its speed still higher, trying to disarm the beast it faced. Fey  
released the Juushin Jisei Juuryoku still further, until he could match  
the dark being's speed, nearly losing his sword before he got there.   
  
Ranko faded back, and began weaving a spell about them both. The demon  
fought with desperate power. It would not allow its chance to ravage the  
mortal plane be so easily denied! Focusing, it began drawing more energy  
from the life around it.   
  
It was the Lady Alana who first noticed and recognized the implications,  
as the trees, shrubs, and grass around the combatants began wilting  
suddenly, for Ranma was focused on his opponent, and Ranko on her spell.  
The Lady's warning to Ranma in his mind came just too late, as the demon  
dumped all his collected and hoarded energy into a single movement,  
pushing his speed, in that instant, far beyond what it had been, and in  
a lightning fast movement, he struck off the Lord Fey's head.  
  
The watchers on the height cried out in dismay and despair, as for the  
first time, Fey's aura dimmed, and they could see him clearly, and  
watch, as the head rolled slowly away from the body.   
  
Ranko screamed in denial, as streams of tears poured from Alana's eyes.  
Ranko finished her spell with a cry of vengeance, and released the  
Juushin Jisei Juuryoku in a single swift rush of power. Moving far  
beyond the speed that even the dark beast had achieved in its moment of  
triumph, she struck of its limbs and then pierced its chest with her  
blade.  
  
Its flames died about it, as it screamed in fear. This was impossible,  
this was its moment of triumph, it could not be defeated now! It strove  
once again to throw itself back, to remove itself from the piercing  
blade that had riven its chest, but it found itself held still, unabled  
to escape, as Ranko focused the Juushin Jisei upon it.   
  
Ranko poured the full force of her released aura into her blade,  
and the cleansing flames surged down the dragon blade, searing its flesh  
from the inside, as heat built within. It screamed then, white flames  
bursting from its mouth, then its eyes, and ears. Wounds opened that had  
healed long centuries before, it felt again the touch of every weapon of  
light it had faced, and white light poured from those old wounds as they  
split.   
  
The demon vanished, cleansed from existence by the searing fire of one  
pure spirit, and Ranko collapsed to the ground in tears of agony.   
  
[r...ranko?]  
  
Ranko looked up, then looked about wildly. Where had that voice come  
from?  
  
[Ranma!?]  
  
[Ohhh... that hurts...]  
  
[Ranma, where are you!?]  
  
[Itetete... I'm back in the house, Ranko... the house you built. I  
guess... since that wasn't really my body... I didn't go with it. Give  
me a minute to recover here.]  
  
Ranko was startled away from her conversation by the impact of the Lady  
Alana, wrapping her in a tearful hug. "I'm so sorry, Ranko. He... he was  
doing so well... I was too slow, oh, I'm sorry, I'm sorry..." Alana  
sobbed as she held Ranko tightly, feeling sorrow at her loss, and  
gratefulness that her daughter had survived in equal measure.  
  
"Lady... he didn't die," whispered Ranko, trying to soothe her.  
  
Alana pulled back, staring with wide eyes into her face. "He lives?!"  
  
Ranma appeared suddenly behind Alana, and Ranko turned her to face him.  
He was pale and transparent, like a ghost, and the blood drained from  
Alana's face. "It's alright Alana," whispered Ranko, holding her tightly  
from behind, "He's not dead."   
  
She looked at Ranma. "I guess you need a new aura, huh?"  
  
He looked down sheepishly. "Uh, yeah... if you don't mind."   
  
With the Juushin Jisei Juuryoku completely released, Ranko was feeling  
surfeited with power, but rather than following the procedure they had  
once before, she decided to try a technique she had learned from the  
Amazon healer.   
  
Granted, it was intended to share ki between two individuals in two  
separate bodies, but then Ranma had always been one for improvising. A  
thin thread of ki reached out from Ranko, and wrapped about Ranma, then  
thickened, and the flow began. In moments, Ranma had enough aura to  
recreate his body.   
  
"Thanks, Ranko love." Ranma enveloped his sister in a hug. "It won't  
take long now for my ki to recover.   
  
---  
  
Several days later, they said their goodbyes to Alana. She took Ranma  
aside first. "Ranma. You have the blood of a dragon now. And if you find  
someone worthy, you can give them your blood, as I gave you mine. It is  
your choice to do so, and it will affect them less than mine did you,  
but remember, once given, it cannot be taken back, and it will affect  
them and their heirs for many generations. Be careful."  
  
"I will Mother. I promise. Will you stay here, in Fey castle?"  
  
"Yes child. I grew to loathe it in the years I was Fey's servant. In the  
years with you, I have grown to love it again. I will maintain your  
place in this kingdom. I hope you will bring your bride to meet me, and  
I hope even more that you will consider bringing her here to live with  
us. And if you do, Ranma, consider this. If you bring your loves here,  
you are the law. You have more than enough love for one woman. Many  
societies allow multiple wives, and most of those that surround us do  
so. If you have only one wife, I fear they will never stop trying to  
capture you for their daughters, as they did when you were at the Mage  
Towers. If you find you cannot choose without hurting where you do not  
want to hurt, bring them here, where you can love them all. And now that  
you have given Ranko her own life, let her find a love, or loves, as she  
will. Do not let jealousy come between you. And should you grow to love  
Ranko too much, bring her too. She is you, and there is no shame in  
loving yourself."   
  
She looked into his troubled eyes. "And the body Jusenkyou gave her is  
not your body, and its seed is not your seed. Even should she have your  
child, it will not bear harm. Now stop gaping at me, and go find your  
birth mother, and at least one to love."   
  
So saying, she led Ranma back to the group. He had been fighting a blush  
throughout her little speech, but by the time he had gotten back, it was  
gone. Ranko, however, was blushing like a little cherry, and would not  
look at him, and Xian Pu was looking at her curiously. He said nothing  
to her about it, afraid of what it might mean, but strangely hopeful.  
  
---  
  
Ukyou and Ryouga followed the Lady Alana, as she led them from the  
castle proper through several courtyards. Ukyou's eyes watered as they  
passed the crystal rosebush, and she thought again of the story Xian Pu  
had told them. If Ranma had done that for someone he had hardly known...  
she sighed, trying to imagine what it would be like if he had stayed  
with her, and loved her. It would not have been the same... he would not  
have been the same, and this beautiful Dragon Lady would still be in  
terrible bondage to a cruel and evil man. She could not wish that on  
anyone, and she held Ryoga's hand tighter.  
  
Ryoga heard her sigh, as she pulled him along, keeping him from getting  
lost. He did not notice the crystal rosebush, nor have any idea what  
made her sigh, but when he felt her grip tighten, he smiled at the  
thought that whatever it was that pained her, it was to him that she  
turned for comfort. It didn't bother him that in fact she had not  
turned, and was still hauling him along. He hoped he understood what  
that additional pressure meant, and believed he did, and his heart  
soared to think that he could give her comfort.  
  
The Lady led them to some stables that stood near the massive front  
gates. There were seven horses there, three well-laden, sturdy horses,  
and four saddled horses carrying much lighter loads.   
  
Both Ukyou and Ryouga were shocked when a young Japanese looking man  
moved towards them from amongst the horses. Despite being skilled  
martial artists neither of them had noticed the man. He had short black  
hair, and was wearing black leather. He looked young, younger than  
themselves, maybe fourteen or fifteen.  
  
He stepped towards them as they approached, and bowed low toward the  
Lady, then turned towards Ukyou and Ryouga, and bowed again. "Greetings.  
I am Fey Li, Master of the Fey Musabetso Kakutou Ryu. I will be one of  
your guides to the Lady Sylie."  
  
"Greetings," Ukyou replied, responding with a bow of her own. "I am  
Kuonji Ukyou."  
  
"And I," Ryouga replied, bowing in turn, "am Hibiki Ryouga. I thank you  
for your willingness to guide us."  
  
"It is my duty and my pleasure to serve the Lord Fey. No thanks are  
required." Li bowed again to the Lady.  
  
She bowed slightly in return, then turned to glance at Ukyou and Ryouga.  
"I will leave you in Li's care. Please return safely." They bowed to  
her, and she left.  
  
Ukyou watched her leave, then turned back to look at Li.   
  
Two hours later, the Lady Alana sat at a window in the library tower,  
and watched as the small party rode out of the gates. She sighed...  
alone again. She might be able to survive Ranma's distance, now, but it  
did not ease the ache in her heart.   
  
She mulled over several possibilities before finally settling on one.  
She would train a replacement to manage the day to day affairs of the  
nation, then she would journey to Ranma's world. The thought made her  
feel young again. 


End file.
